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EATIOJIAL ANIMaI.8. 



YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN; 



Ef)z mfir!)t moatu tSroufll) Hife. 



A STORY TO SHOW HOW YOUNG BENJAMIN LEARNED THE PRINCIPLES 

WHICH RAISED HIM FROM A PRINTER'S BOY TO THE FIRST 

EMUASSADOR OF THE AMERICAN EEPUULIC. 



A BOY'S BOOK ON A BOY'S OWN SUBJECT. 



BY 



HENRY MAYHEW, 

ATTTHOB OF "THE PEASANT-BOY PHILOSOPHER," "THE WONDERS OP 

science; or, young Humphrey davy," &c., &c. 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY JOHN GILBERT. 



NEW YORK: 
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 

FRANKLIN SQUARE, 
1862. 






60721 



"But the work shall not be lost." — Passaoe from the Epitax>h of 
Benjamin Franklin^ ivritten by himself. 

"It's hard for an empty sack to stand upright." — Proverb from Poor 
mchard's Almanac. 



70 



TO THE 

RIGHT HOK EDWARD HENRY, 

LORD STANLEY, M.P., Etc., Etc., Etc. 

My Lord, — You have been so uniformly kind 
to me in my labors upon social matters, that, as 
the present book treats of subjects in which you 
have always taken a lively interest, I have avail- 
ed myself of this opportunity of expressing my 
gratitude to you, and of assuring you that I am, 
my lord, yours, with every sentiment of esteem 
for your friendship and admiration for your gen- 
ius, 

Henry Mayhew. 

3 Kensington Square, 17th December. 



PREFACE. 



It was Walter Scott who first raised his voice 
against the folly of writing down to the child, 
saying, wisely enough, that the true object among 
authors for th^ young should be to write the 
child up to the man. As people talk broken En- 
gHsh to Frenchmen, and nurses prattle the baby 
dialect to babies, so it was once thought that boys' 
books should be essentially puerile — as puerile in 
subject and puerile in style as the tales about 
"Don't-care Harry" (who was torn to pieces by 
a hungry lion merely because he would persist in 
declaring that he "didn't care" about certain 
things in life), and such-like tender bits of ver- 
dure that used to grace the good old English 
spelling-books of some quarter of a century back. 

Conformably to the Walter Scott theory, this 
volume has not been penned with the object of 
showing boys the dehght of slaying a buffalo or 
a bison, nor yet with the view of impressing upon 
them the nobility of fighting or fagging at school. 
The one purpose of the book is to give young 
men some sense of the principles that should 
guide a prudent, honorable, generous, and refined 
gentleman through the world. It does not pre- 



viii PREFACE. 

tend to teach youth the wonders of optics, chem- 
istry, or astronomy, but to open young eyes to 
the universe of beauty that encompasses every 
enlightened spirit, and to give the young knights 
of the present day some faint idea of the chivahy 
of Hfe, as well as to develop in them, some little 
sense of, and taste for, the poetry of action and 
the grace of righteous conduct. 

It has long appeared to the author that the 
modern system of education is based on the fal- 
lacy that to manufacture a wise man is necessari- 
ly to rear a good one. The intellect, however, is 
but the servant of the conscience (the impulses or 
propensities of mankind being merely the execu- 
tive^ rather than the governing and originating 
faculty of our natures) ; and hence the grand mis- 
take of the teachers of our time has been to de- 
velop big brains at the cost of little hearts — to 
cram with science and to ignore poetry — to force 
the scholar with a perfect hot-bed of languages, 
and yet to stunt the worthy with an utter want 
of principle ; in fine, to rear Palmers, Dean Pauls, 
Kedpaths, Davisons, Robsons, Hughes, Watts, 
and a whole host of well-educated and hypocrit- 
ical scoundrels, rather than a race of fine upright 
gentlemen. Society, however, seems to have had 
its fill of the mechanics' institute mania ; the 
teachy-preachy fever appears to have come to a 
crisis ; and, in the lull of the phrensy, the author 
of the i^reseut book wishes to say his say upon 
the means of worldly welfare, the laws of worldly 



PREFACE. IX 

happiness, and the rules of worldly duty to the 
young men of the present generation. 

As to the handling of the subject, some expla- 
nation is needed. Uncle Benjamin, who is made 
the expounder of the Franklinian philosophy to 
the boy Benjamin himself, is not a purely imagi- 
nary character. He has been elaborated into 
greater importance here, certainly, than he as- 
sumes in the biography of his nephew ; but this 
has been done upon that Shaksperian rule of art, 
which often throws an internal moral princi|)le 
into an external dramatis 2^erso7ia / and as the 
witches in Macbeth are merely the outward em- 
bodiment, in a weird and shadowy form, of Mac- 
beth's own ambition, and have obviously been in- 
troduced into the play with the view of giving a 
kind of haunted and fatalistic air to a bloody and 
devouring passion (a passion, indeed, that, if rep- 
resented really and crudely, rather than ideally 
and grandly, as it is, would have made the trag- 
edy an object of execration instead of sympathy 
— a bit of filthy literality out of the Royal New- 
gate Calendar, instead of a fine supernatural bit 
of fate, overshadowed with the same sense of 
doom as an old Greek play) ; even so, in a small 
way, has Uncle Ben here been made the expo- 
nent of the Franklin view of life, rather than his 
nephew Benjamin to be the first to conceive and 
develop it. Some may urge that, by this means, 
the genius of Franklin is reduced from its origi- 
nal, cast-iron, economic character, to a mere sec- 



PREFACE. 

ond-rate form of prudential mind. Nevertheless, 
there must have been soine reason for the printer- 
embassador's " Poor Richardism ;" say it was or- 
ganization, temperament, or idiosyncrasy, if you 
will, that made him the man he was ; still the 
replication to such a plea is, that even these are 
now acknowledged to be more or less derivative 
qualities, in which the family type is often found 
either exaggerated into genius or dwarfed into 
idiocy. Hence it is believed that no very great 
historic violence has been committed here in mak- 
ing a member of the Franklin family the father 
of Benjamin Franklin's character, even as his par- 
ents were assuredly the progenitors of his " lithi- 
asisJ^ Moreover, Uncle Benjamin was his god- 
father, and that in the days when godfathership 
was regarded as a far different duty (the duty of 
moral and religious supervision) from the mere 
bit of silver-spoon-and-fork-odand that it is now. 
Again, from the printer's own description of the 
character of his uncle, it is plain that Uncle Ben 
was not the man to ignore any duty he had taken 
upon himself Besides, the old man lived in the 
house with Benjamin's father, and had himself 
only one son (who was grown up and settled as 
a cutler in the town) ; so that, as the uncle was 
comparatively childless, it has been presumed that 
the instinctive fondness of age for youth might 
have led the old boy to be taken with the bud- 
ding intellect and principles of his little nephew . 
and namesake, and thus to have exceeded his 



PREFACE. xi 

sponsorial duties so far as to have become the 
boy's best friend and counselor, loving him like a 
son, and training him like a novice. -Farther we 
know that Uncle Benjamin was a man of some 
observation and learning ; he appears also to have 
been a person of considerable leisure, and perhaps 
of some little means (for we do not hear of his 
following any occupation in America) ; so that, 
when we remember how slight is the addition 
that even the profoundest geniuses make to the 
knowledge-fund of the world, and how little ad- 
vance those who take even the longest strides 
make upon such as have gone before them, we 
can not but admit that Franklin must have got 
the substratum of his knowledge and principles 
somewhere — since, born under different circum- 
stances, he would have been a wholly different 
man. Surely, then, there is no great offense of- 
fered to truth in endeavoring to explain artistic- 
ally how Benjamin Franklin became the man he 
was, nor any great wrong done to history in using 
Uncle Ben as the means of making out to youths 
what was the peculiar " Old Richard" philosophy 
that distinguished the printer-sage in after life. 
The main object was to give the young reader a 
sense of the early teachings Benjamin Franklin 
when a boy might have received (and doubtlessly 
did receive) from his old Non-conformist uncle, 
and accordingly the latter has been made, if not 
the virtual hero, at least the prime mover of the 
incidents in the present book. 



xii PREFACE. 

Those critics who know the difficulties of the 
problem with which the author has had to deal — 
who are acquainted with the many speculations 
that have been advanced as to the seat and sources 
of the intellectual and other pleasures of our na- 
ture, will readily discern that the principles here 
enunciated have not been " decanted" out of pre- 
vious aesthetic treatises, but are peculiar to the 
present work, and spring — naturally, it is hoped 
— from the idiosyncrasy of the characters enun- 
ciating them. Again, it is but fair to enforce that 
the views here given as to the means by which 
labor is made pleasant have sprung out of the 
author's previous investigations rather than his 
readings, and so, indeed, has that part of the book 
which seeks to impress the reader with a livelier 
sense of the claims of the luckless, and even the 
criminal, to our respect and earnest consideration. 
Principles, in fine, that have cost the author a life 
to acquire, are often expressed in a chapter, and 
expressed, it is hoped, sufficiently in keeping with 
the current of the story to render it difficult for 
the reader to detect where the function of dram- 
atizing ends and that of propounding begins. 

The "jail 23roper" described in this book is 
hardly the jail proper belonging to little Benja- 
min Franklin's time. 

Nor has the deviation from historic propriety 
been made unadvisedly. It is generally as idle as 
it is morbid to paint past horrors. To have set 
forth the atrocities and iniquities practiced in the 



PREFACE. xili 

British jails a century and a half ago would have 
been following in the track of the pernicious 
French school of literature, where every thing is 
sacrificed to melodramatic intensity, and which is 
forever striving to excite a spasm rather than 
gratify a taste. 

The genius of true English landscape painting, 
on the contrary, is " repose ;" and the genius of 
modern English jDoetry is " repose" too — a kind 
of Sabbath feeling which turns the heart from the 
grossnesses and vanities of human life, and lets 
the work-day spirit loose among the quiet, shady, 
and healthful beauties of nature. The intense 
school and the repose school are the two far-dis- 
tant extremes of all art, and they differ as much 
from each other as the sweet refreshment of an 
evening by one's own fireside does from the heat- 
ed stimulus of a tavern debauch. 

For these artistic reasons, then, the dead bones 
of the old jail iniquities and cruelties have not 
been disinterred and set up as a bugaboo here. 
Such a picture might have been true to the time, 
but mere Uteral truth is a poor thing after all. 
Why, Gustave le Gray's wonderful photograph of 
the Sunlight on the Sea, that is hanging before 
our eyes as we write, is as true as " Mangnall's 
Questions;" and yet what a picturesque barba- 
rism, and even falsity it is ! It no more renders 
what only human genius can seize and paint — the 
expression, the feeling, the soul of such a scene — 
than the camera obscura can fac-simile the human 



xiv PREFACE. 

eye in a portrait, or give us the faintest glimmer 
of the high Vandyke quality — the profound think- 
ing, talking pupils of that grand old countenance 
in our National Gallery. 

But the real object which the author of this 
book had in view was to wake not only his boy 
hero up to a sense of duty, but other boys also, 
and to let them know (even without doing any 
great violence to the natural truth of things) what 
prison iniquities are still daily wrought in the land 
in which we live. The jail proj^er of the present 
story (though the scene is laid in British Amer- 
ica before the declaration of Indej)endence, and 
dates a century and a half back) is a mere tran- 
scrijit of a well-known jail now standing in the 
first city in the world in the year of our Lord one 
thousand eight hundred and sixty. The details 
given here are the bare literalities noted by tlie 
author only a few months back, and prmted in his 
account of the metropolitan prisons in that wretch- 
ed fragment of a well-meant scheme, the " Great 
World of London." There, if the skeptic needs 
proof, he can get chapter and verse, and learn 
that many of the facts here given were recorded 
in the presence of some of the visiting justices 
themselves. Jails may have been bad a hundred 
years ago, but this plague-spot of the first city in 
the world seems to the author worse than all, be- 
cause it still goes on after Howard's labors — after 
Brougham's reforms — after Sheriff Watson's fine 
industrial schools ; yes, there it stands, giving the 



PEEFACE. XV 

lie to all our May -day meetings, our ragged 
schools, our city missions, and pretended love of 
the destitute, the weak, and the suffering. We 
no longer wonder that the atrocities of the French 
Bastille roused the Parisian people to rush off in 
a body and tumble the old prison-citadel down 
into a heap of ruins ; and if Tothill Fields lay 
across the Channel, the same indignant outrage 
might perhaps be again enacted. But here, good 
easy citizens as we are, we pay our jDoor-rates ; 
we call ourselves miserable sinners, in a loud 
voice, once a week, from a cosy pew ; our " good 
lady" belongs to a district visiting society, and 
distributes tracts in the back slums ; we put our 
check into the plate, after a bottle or two of port, 
at a charity dinner; and, this done, we are self- 
content. 

We once passed a quiet half hour with Mr. Cal- 
craft, the hangman, and in the course of the con- 
versation he alluded to 3frs. Calcraft ! The words 
no sooner fell upon the ear than a world of won- 
der filled the brain. Even Ae, then, had some- 
body to care about him. There was somebody 
to hug and caress him before he left his home in 
that scratch wig and fur cap in which we saw 
him come disguised to Newgate (for the "roughs" 
had threatened to shoot him), and carrying that 
small ominous satchel basket, at two in the morn- 
ing, on the day of Bousfield's execution. 

The wretched lads in Tothill Fields prison are 
worse off than Calcraft himself. They have no- 
body in the world to care about them. 



xvi PREFACE. 

Nobody ! Yet, stay, we forget ; there is this 
same Calcraft to look after a good many of them. 

In fine — to drop the author and speak in pro- 
p7'id 2^ersond — I have attempted to write a book 
which, while it treated of some subject that a boy 
would be likely to attend to, should at the same 
time admit of enunciating such principles as I 
wished my oion boy, and other boys as good, and 
as honest, and earnest as he, to carry mth them 
through life ; and yet I have striven, while writing 
it, to do no positive violence to truth either in the 
love of one's art or in the heat of one's " purpose." 
In plain English, I have sought to be consistent 
to nature — true to the spirit, perhaps, rather than 
the letter of things — even though I had a pecul- 
iar scheme to work out. And now, such as it is, 
I give the present volume to the youth of the 
time, in the hope that it may serve them for what 
I myself felt the want of more than any thing 
after leaving "Westminster School, as a young 
man crammed to the tip of one's tongue with 
Latin and Greek and nothing else, viz., for some- 
thing like a guide to what Uncle Ben calls " the 
right road through life." 

Hy. M. 



YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 



PAKT I. 

YOUNG ben's love OF THE SEA, AND HOW HE 
WAS AVEANED EKOM IT. 



CHAPTER I. 

"what ever shall we do with the boy?" 

A PRETTY dmbby-faced boy, with a pair of 
cheeks rosy and plump as ripe peaches, was Mas- 
ter Benjamin Franklin in his teens. 

Dressed in a tiny three-cornered hat, a very 
small pair of "smalls," or knee-breeches, and a 
kind of little, stiff-skirted, fan-tailed surtout, he 
looked like a Greenwich pensioner in miniatm*e, 
or might have been mistaken (had the colors been 
gayei-) for the little fat fairy coachman to Cinde- 
rella's state carriage. 

It would have made a pretty picture to have 
handed down to our time could an artist have 
sketched the boy, as he sat beside his toy ship, in 
the old-fashioned, dark back parlor behind the tal- 
low-chandler's store, " at the corner of Hanover 
and Union Streets," in the city of Boston, New 
England. 

Over the half curtain of a glass door a long deep 
fringe of white candles, varied with heavy, tassel- 
like bunches of " sixes" and " eights," might be 
seen dangling from the rafters of the adjoining 



18 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

shop, with here and there several small stacks of 
yellow and white soap, in ingot-like bars, ranged 
along the upper shelves ; and the eye could also 
catch glimpses of the square brown paper cap 
which crowned the head of Josiah Franklin (the 
proprietor of the establishment, and father of out 
Benjamin) wandering busily about, as the shop- 
bell was heard to tinkle-tinkle with the arrival of 
fresh customers, seeking supplies of the "best 
mottled" or " dips." 

The back parlor itself, being lighted only from 
the shop, was dim as a theatre by day, so that all 
around was wrapped in the rich transparent 
brown shade of what artists call " clear obscure." 
The little light pervading the room shone in faint 
lustrous patches upon the bright pewter platters 
and tin candlesticks that were arranged as orna- 
ments on the narroAV wooden mantelpiece, while 
it sparkled in spots in one corner of the apartment, 
where, after a time, the eye could just distinguish 
a few old china cups and drinking-glasses set out 
on the shelves of the triangular cupboard. 

In this little room sat Benjamin's mother, spin- 
ning till the walls hummed like a top with the 
drone of her wheel, and his sister Deborah, who 
was busy making a mainsail for the boy's cutter 
out of an old towel, now that she had finished 
setting the earthen porringers for the family sup- 
per of bread and milk ; while young Ben himself 
appeared surrounded with a litter of sticks intend- 
ed for masts and yards, and whipcord for rigging, 
and with the sailless hull of his home-made vessel 
standing close beside him on its little stocks (made 
out of an inverted wooden footstool), and seem- 
ing as if ready to be " laid up in ordinary" — un- 
der the dresser. 

The boy had grown tired of his daily work ; for 
the candle-wicks which his father had set him to 



" WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THE BOY ?" 19 

cut lay in tufts about the deck of his boat, and the 
few snips of cotton on the sanded floor told how 
little of his task he had done since dinner-time * 
Indeed, it did not require much sagacity to per- 
ceive that Benjamin hated the unsavory pursuits 
of soap-boiling and candle-making, and delighted 
in the more exciting enterprises of shipping and 
seafaring. On the bench at his elbow was the 
bundle of rushes that had been given him to trim, 
in readiness for what was his especial horror — the 
approaching "melting-day," together with the 
frame of pewter moulds that required to be clean- 
ed for the new stock of " cast candles." But botli 
of these were in the same state as he had received 
them in the morning; whereas the coat of the 
boy, and the ground all about him, were speckled 
with chips ifrom the old broomstick that he had 
been busy shaping into a main-mast for his minia- 
ture yacht, and near at hand were two small pip- 
kins filled with a pennyworth of black and white 
paint, with which he had been striping the sides 
of the little vessel, and printing the name of the 

" FLYING DUTCHMAN, OF BOSTON," UpOU her Stcm. 

The craft itself did no small credit to young 
Benjamin's skill as a toy ship-builder, though cer- 
tainly her " lines" were more in the washing-tub 
style of naval architecture than the " wave-princi- 
ple" of modern American clippers ; for the hull 

* "At ten years old," are Franklin's own words, given in 
the history of his boyhood, written by himself, " I was taken 
to help my father in his business, which was that of a tallow- 
chandler and soap-boiler— a business to which he was not 
bred, but had assumed on his arrival in New England, be- 
cause he found that his dyeing trade, being in little request, 
would not maintain his family. Accordingly, I was employ- 
ed in cutting wicks for the candles, filling the moulds for 
' cast candles,' attending to the shop, and going errands, etc." 
At the opening of our story, the lad is supposed to have been 
some time at this trade. 



20 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

was fashioned after the shape of the Dutch " dog- 
ger-boats" in the Boston harbor, and had the ap- 
j^earance of an enormous wooden shoe. 

It had taken one of the largest logs from the 
wood-house to build the boat, for she was the size 
of a doll's cradle at least. It had cost no little 
trouble, too, and broken not a few gouges in hol- 
lowing out a " hold" for her — even as big as a pie- 
dish ; and now that the mighty task had been ac- 
complished, she had sufficient capacity under her 
hatches to carry a crew of white mice, and might, 
on an emergency, have stowed away victuals 
for a squirrel skipper to winter upon. 

Yet, in bis heart, Benjamin found little pleasure 
in the amusement. He knew he was neglecting 
his work for it ; he knew, too, that his half-Puri- 
tan father regarded disobedience as the prime 
cause of all error, so that playing at such a time 
was, after allj but sorry, deadly-lively sport to him. 
Instead of being delighted with the pastime, he 
went about it in fear and trembling — with one eye 
on the miniature mast he was shaj^ing, and the 
other intently watching the movements of the 
dreaded brown paper cap in the shop without. 
Every turn of the door-handle made his little heart 
flutter like a newly-trapped bird, and every aj)- 
proaching footstep was like the click of a pistol 
in his ear; so that the stick almost fell from his 
hand involuntarily with the fright, and the candle- 
wicks and scissors were suddenly snatched up in- 
stead, while an air of the most intense industry 
was assumed for the time being. 

Indeed, the boy's life of late had been one con- 
tinual struggle and fight between his inclinations 
and his duty. For the last two years he had been 
supposed to be engaged at his father's business, 
though, from the work being any thing but a " la- 
bor of love" to him, he had really been occupied 



"what shall we do with the boy?" 21 

with other things. He was forever lon^incr to 
get away to sea, and nothing delighted him'but 
what, so to si3eak, smacked of "the tar;" where- 
as he sickened at the smell of the " melting-days," 
and the mere sight of the tallow was associated 
m his mind with a youthful horror of mutton fat * 
Born and bred within a stone's throw of the 
beautiful Bay of Massachusetts, his earliest games 
with the children of his acquaintance had been in 
jumping from barge to barge alongside the quay, 
and ever since the little fellow had been breeched 
he had been able to scull a boat across the " ba- 
sin," Avhile in his schoolhood he and his cronies 
were sure every holiday to be out sailing or row- 
mg over to some one of the hundred islands that 
dap2iled the blue expanse of water round about 
the city. 

Steering had been the boy's first exercise of 
power, and the pleasure the little cockswain had 
felt in making the boat answer as readily as his 
own muscles to his will had charmed him with 
the sailor's life, while the danger connected with 
the pursuit served only to increase the delight of 
triumphing over the difficuHies. Again, to his 
young fancy, a ship at sea seemed as free as the 
gull ni the airf (though it has been well said, on 
the contrary, that a ship is a " prison without any 
* "I disliked the trade," Franklin tells us himself, in the 
account of his early life, *'and had a strong inclination to 
go to sea ; my father, however, declared against it. But, re- 
sidmg near the water, I was much in it and on it. I learn- 
ed to swim well, and to manage boats ; and when embarked 
with other boys I was commonly allowed to govern, especial- 
ly in case of any difficulty." 

t The writer (who was a midshipman in his youth) would 
seriously advise boys to abandon all such silly notions as to 
the pleasures of a sailor's life, for he can conscientiously say 
that It IS not only the hardest and most perilous of all call- 
mgs, but one in which the living, the housing, and the gains 
are of the poorest possible kind. 



22 YOUNG BENJAMIN FHANKLIN. 

chance of escape"). Nor did he ever see a ves- 
sel, with its white pouty sails, glide like a snowy 
summer cloud across the bay toward the silver 
ring of the horizon without wondering what the 
sailors would find beyond it, and longing to be 
with the crew, to visit strange countries and peo- 
ple, and see Avhat the earth was like, and whether 
it was really true that there was no end to the 
world, nor any place where one could stand on 
the brink of it, and look down into the great well 
of space below. 

For the last hour or two, however, the youth 
had laid aside his ship tools, and, having given his 
sister instructions about the sail she had promised 
to make for him, had taken from his pocket the 
book which his brother-in-law. Captain Holmes — 
he who had married his half-sister Ruth, and was 
master of a sloop — had brought him that day (as 
he ran in at dinner-time just to shake hands Avith 
them all), on his return from his last voyage to En- 
gland. Benjamin had been burning to read the vol- 
ume all the day long; for it was entitled '-^The Ad- 
ventures of Robinson Crusoe^ 3Iariner^hy Daniel 
De Foe^^'' and the captain had told him that it had 
" only just been published in London" at the time 
when he had set sail from that port. 

From his earliest childhood the little fellow had 
been " passionately fond" of reading, and all the 
halfpence his big brothers and his Uncle Benja- 
min gave him he was accustomed to devote to 
the purchase of books.* A new book, therefore, 

* "From my infancy," says our hero, in the narrative of 
liis boyhood, "I was passionately fond of reading, and all 
the money that came into my hands was laid out in the pur- 
chasing of books. I was very fond of voyages. . . . My fa- 
ther's little library consisted chiefly of works on polemic di- 
vinity, most of which I read. I have often regretted that, 
at a time when I had such a thirst for knowledge, more 



" WHAT SHALL WE DO WITH THE BOY ?" 23 

was the greatest treat that could possibly have 
been offered him, and such a one as his brother- 
in-law had brought him (for he had already turn- 
ed over the leaves, and seen that it was about a 
sailor cast away on a desert island) was more than 
he could keep his eyes off till bedtime. 

It had been like a red-hot coal in his pocket all 
day. 

So, now that his mast was " stepped," and Deb- 
orah was getting on with the sail, young Benja- 
min had got the volume spread open on his knees, 
and was too deeply absorbed in the marvelous 
history of Crusoe's strange island life to think 
either of the wicks, the rushes, or the mould for 
the " cast candles," or even the punishment that 
surely awaited him for his neglect. 

Again and again his mother had entreated him 
to put down the volume and go on with the 
wicks. 

" Benjamin," she would cry aloud, to rouse the 
lad from the trance he had fallen into, " do give 
over reading till after work-time, there's a good 
child !" 

The eager boy, however, sat with his nose al- 
most buried in the leaves, and, without raising his 
eyes from the book, merely begged to be allowed 
to read to the end of " that chapter ;" though no 
sooner was one finished than the pages were turn- 
ed over to learn the length of the next, and an- 
other begun. 

"I wish Captain Holmes had never brought 
you the book!" the kind-hearted mother would 
exclaim, with a sigh, while she tapped the treadle 
of her wheel the quicker for the thought — inter- 
proper books had not fallen in my way. There was among 
them ' Plutarch's Lives,' which I read abundantly, and still 
think that time spent to great advantage. There was also 
a book of De Foe's, called ' An Essay on Projects.' "' 



24 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

jecting the next minute, as she heard the shop- 
bell tinkle, and stretched up her neck, as usual, 
to look over the blind, and see who was the noAv- 
comer : " Why, there's your Uncle Benjamin got 
back from meeting, I declare ! It will only lead, 
I'm afraid, to fresh words between you and your 
father. Your head, Ben, is too full of the sea al- 
ready, without any vain story-books of sailors' ad- 
ventures to lead you astray." 

" I am sure it was very kind of the captain," 
little Ben would reply, " to make me such a nice 
present ; but he always brings every one of us 
something at the end of each voyage. I can't 
talk to you, though, just now, mother ; for, if I 
was to get the strap for it, I couldn't break off in 
the middle of this story — it's so nice and interest- 
ing, you can't tell ;" and the lad again bent his 
head over the pages, so that the long hair, that 
usually streamed down upon his shoulders, hung 
over the leaves, and he kept tossing the locks 
peevishly back as he gloated over the text. 

In a moment he was utterly lost again in the 
imaginary scenes before him; and then he no more 
heard his mother tell him that she was sure it Avas 
time to think about putting the shutters up, than 
if he had been fast asleep. Neither could sister 
Deborah get a word from him, even though she 
wanted instructions as to where to place the lit- 
tle " reef-points" upon his mimic main-sail. 

" Benjamin ! Benjamin !" cried the mother, as 
she rose from her wheel and shook the boy, to 
rouse him from his trance, " do you know, sirrah, 
that your father will be in to supper directly, 
and here you haven't cut so much as one bundle 
of wicks all the day through? How shall I be 
able to screen you again from his anger, so strict 
as lie is?" 

The boy stared vacantly, as though he had been 



"what shall we do with the boy?" 25 

suddenly waked up out of a deep slumber, and 
began to detail the incidents of the story he had 
just read, after the fashion of boys in general, 
from the time when stories were first invented. 
" Crusoe gets shipwrecked, you know, mother," 
he started off, "and then he makes a raft, and 
goes off to the vessel, you knoAV, and saves a lot 
of things from the ship, you know, and then, you 
know — " 

"There! there! have done, boy!" cried the 
mother, in alarm ; " this madness for the sea will 
be the ruin of you. Just think of the life Josiah 
Franklin has led since he went off as a cabin-boy, 
shortly after your father's first wife died; for, 
though he was the late Mrs. Franklin's pet child, 
I've heard your father say that he shut his doors 
upon him when he came back shoeless and shirt- 
less at the year's end, and whatever has become 
of the poor boy now, the Lord above only knows."* 

" But, mother," persisted the lad, whose brain 
was still so inflamed by the excitement of the 
wondrous narrative that he could neither speak 
nor think of any thing else, " only let me tell you 
about what I have been reading — it's so beautiful 
— and then I'll listen patiently to whatever you've 
got to say ;" and, without waiting for an answer, 
Ben began again : " Well, you know, mother, Cru- 
soe gets a barrel or two of gunpowder from off 
the wreck, you know, and some tools as well ; and 

* "I continued thus employed," says Franklin, in his 
Autobiography, " in my father's business for two years — that 
is, till I was twelve years old ; and then my brother John, 
who was bred to that business, having left my father, and 
married, and set up for himself at Rhode Island, there was 
every appearance that I was destined to supply his place, 
and become a tallow-chandler. But my dislike to the trade 
continuing, my father had apprehensions that, if he did not 
put me to one more agreeable, I should break loose to go to 
sea, as my brother Josiah had done, to his great vexation." 



26 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

then he sets to Tvork, you know, and builds him- 
self a hut on the uninhabited island." 

The dame paid no heed to the incidents detail- 
ed by the lad, but kept stretching her neck over 
the curtain of the glass door, and watching first 
the figure of her husband in the shop, and then 
glancing at the wooden clock against the wall, as 
if she dreaded the coming of the supper-hour, 
when she knew his father would be sure to de- 
mand of Benjamin an account of his day's work. 

She was about to snatch the book from the 
boy's hands, and remove the cottons and the 
rushes out of sight, when suddenly the A^oice of 
the father, caUing for Benjamin to bring him the 
wicks, dispelled the boy's dream, and made the 
mother tremble almost as much as it did the lad 
himself. 

" Oh, mother, you'll beg me off once more, 
won't you?" sobbed the penitent Benjamin, as his 
disobedience noAv flashed upon him, for he knew 
how often his father had pardoned him for the 
same fault, and that he had warned him that no 
entreaties should prevent him punishing him se- 
verely for the next offense. 

" Benjamin, I say !" shouted the voice, authori- 
tatively, from the shop. 

" Go to him, child," urged the mother, as she 
patted her pet boy (for he was the youngest) on 
the head to give him courage, " and confess your 
fault openly like a little man. You know the 
store your father sets upon a ' contrite heart,' " 
she added, in the conventicle cast of thought pe- 
culiar to the early settlers in New England ; " and 
rest assured, if he but sees you repentant, his an- 
ger will give Avay ; for the aim of all punishment, 
Benjamin, is to chasten, and not to torture; and 
penitence does that through the scourging of the 
spirit, which the other accomplishes through the 
sijiffprino- of thp borlv.'' 



"what shall we do with the boy?" 2T 

" Go you instead of me, mother — do^ now, there's 
a dear. You will, won't you, eh ?" begged the lit- 
tle fellow, as he curled his arm coaxingly about 
her waist, and looked up at her through his tears. 
" Do you tell him, mother, I never shall be able to 
keep to the horrid candle-work, for I hate it — 
that I do ; and though every night, when I lie 
awake, I make vows that I will not vex him again, 
but strive hard at whatever he gives me to do, 
still, when the next day comes, my heart fails me, 
and my spirit keeps pulling my body away" (the 
boy had caught the Puritanical phrases of the 
time), "and filling my head with the delight of 
being- on the water ; and then, for the life of me, 
I can't keep away from my voyage-books, or my 
little ship, or something that reminds me of the 
sea. If you'd only get him to let me go with 
Captain Holmes — " and, as the dame turned her 
head away, he added quickly, "just for one voy- 
age, dear mother — to see how I like it — oh ! I'd 
— I'd — I don't know what I'd not do for you, 
mother dear ; I'd bring you and Deborah home 
such beautiful things then, and — " 

The boyish protestations were suddenly cut 
short by the sight of the brown paper cap in the 
shop moving toward the parlor ; so, without wait- 
ing to finish the sentence, the affrighted lad flung 
open the side door leading to the staircase, and 
scampered up to his room, with an imaginary par- 
ent following close at his heels. 

Here the little fellow threw himself on the 
"trestle-bed" that stood in one corner of the gar- 
ret, and lay for a time too terrified for tears ; for 
his conscience converted the least noise into the 
approach of his father's footsteps, so that he trem- 
bled like a leaf at every motion, his heart beating 
the while in his bosom like a flail. 



28 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

After a time, however, the lad, finding he was 
left by himself, began to lay aside his fears, and 
to talk, as boys are wont to do, about the hard- 
ships he endured. 

" He was sure he did every thing he possibly 
could," he would mutter to himself, as he whim- 
pered between the words, "and he thought it 
very cruel of them to force him to keep to that 
filthy, nasty candle-making, when they knew he 
couldn't bear it, and, what was more, he never 
should like it, not even if he was to make ever so 
much money at it, and be able to keep a j^ony of 
his own into the bargain. Why wouldn't they 
let him go to sea, he wondered ? He called it 
very unkind, he did." And the boy would doubt- 
lessly have continued in the same strain, had not 
the little pet Guinea-pig, that he kept in an old 
bird-cage in one corner of his room, here given a 
squeak so shrill that it sounded more like the pip- 
ing of a bird than the cry of a beast. 

In a moment Benjamin had forgotten all his 
sorrows, and with the tear-drops still lingering in 
the corner of his eyes — like goutes of rain in flow- 
er-cups after a summer shower — he leaped from 
the bed, saying, " Ahl Master Toby Anderson, 
you want your supper, do you?" and the next 
minute his hand was inside the cage, dragging 
the plump little piebald thing from out its nest of 
hay. 

Then, cuddling the pet creature close up in his 
neck, while he leaned his head on one side so as 
to keep its back warm with his cheek, he began 
prattling away to the animal almost as a mother 
does to her babe. 

" Ah ! Master Tiggy, that's what you like, don't 
you ?" said Benjamin, as he stroked his hand along 
the sleek sides of the tame little thing till it made 
a noise like a cry of joy, somewhat between the 



"what shaxl we do with the boy?" 29 

chirruping of a cricket and the pur of a cat. " You 
like me to rub your back, you do^ you fond little 
rascal ! But I've got bad news for Toby — there's 
no supper for him to-night; no nice bread and 
milk for him to put his little pink tootles in while 
he eats it ; for he's got all the manners of the pig, 
that he has. Ah ! he'll have to go to bed, like 
his poor young master, on an empty stomach ; for 
what do you think, Tiggy dear? — why, they've 
been very unkind to poor Benjamin, that they 
have ;" and the chord once touched, the boy con- 
fided all his sorrows to the pet animal, as if it had 
been one of his cronies at school. 

"I wouldn't treat you so, would I, Toby?" he 
went on, hugging the little thing as he spoke ; 
"for who gives the beauty nice apple-parings? 
and who's a regular little piggy-wiggy for them ? 
— who but Master Toby Anderson here. Ay, but 
to-night my little gentleman will have to eat his 
bed, though it won't be the first time he has done 
that / for he dearly loves a bit of sweet new hay, 
don't you, Tobe?" 

Presently the boy cried, as the animal wriggled 
itself up the sleeve of his coat, "Come down here, 
sir ! come down directly, I say !" and then stand- 
ing up, he proceeded to shake his arm violently 
over the bed till the little black and white ball 
was dislodged from the new nestling-place he had 
chosen. 

" Come here, you little rascal ! Come and let 
me look at you ! There, now, sit up and wash 
yourself with your little paws, like a kitten, for 
yovi're going to bed shortly, I can tell you. Oh, 
he's a beauty, that he is, with his black patch over 
one eye like a little bull-dog, and a little brown 
sjDot at his side, the very color of a pear that's 
gone bad. Then he's got eyes of his own like 
large black beads, and little tiddy ears that are as 



30 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

soft and pinky as rose-leaves. He's a nice clean 
little tiggy, too, and not like those filthy white 
mice that some boys keep, and which have such 
a nasty ratty smell with them — no ! Toby smells 
of nice new hay instead. There ! there's a fine 
fellow for you," cried the lad, as he rubbed up 
the tiny animal's coat the wrong way. " Why, 
he looks like a little baby hog with a mane of 
bristles up his neck. But Toby's no hog, that he 
isn't, for he w^ouldn't bite me even with my finger 
at his mouth — no ! he only nibbles at it, to have a 
game at play, that's all. But come. Master An- 
derson, you must go back to your nest, and make 
the best supper you can off your bed-clothes; for 
you can't sleep with the cat to-night, so you'll 
have to keep yourself warm, old fellow, for I 
couldn't for the life of me go down stairs to get 
Pussy for you to cuddle just now." 

The pet was at length returned to its cage, 
and Benjamin once more left to brood over his 
troubles ; so he flung himself on the bed again, 
and began thinking how he could best avoid the 
punishment that he felt sure awaited him on the 
morrow. 

Yet it was strange, he mused, his father had 
not called him down even to put the shutters up. 
Who had closed the shop ? he wondered. They 
must have done supper by this time. Yes, that 
Avas the clatter of the things being taken away. 
Why didn't Deborah come to him? he always 
did to her when she was in disgrace. Who had 
asked a blessing on the food now he was away ? 
Still he could not make out why he wasn't called 
down. Had mother begged him off as usual ? 
No, that couldn't be, for father had threatened 
last time that he would listen to no more en- 
treaties. Perhaps one of the deacons had come in 



"what shall we do with the boy r' si 

to talk with father about the affairs of the chapel 
ill South Street,* or else Uncle Ben was reading 
to them his short-hand notes of the sermon he had 
gone to hear that evening. f 

Soon, however, the sounds of his father's violin 
below stairs put an end to the boy's conjectures 
as to the occupation of the family, and as he crept 
outside the door to listen, he could hear them all 
joining in a hymn. J 

Still Benjamin could not make out why his pun- 
ishment should be deferred. However, he made 
his mind up to one thing, and that was to be off 
to his brother-in-law, Captain Holmes, at daybreak 
on the morrow, and get him to promise to take 
him as a cabin-boy on his next voyage — for that 
would put an end to all the noises between his 
father and him. 

The plan was no sooner framed than the lad 
was away in spirit again, sailing far over the sea, 
while he listened to the drone of the sacred tune 
below ; until at last, tired out with his troubles, 
he fell asleep as he lay outside the bed, and woke 

* "I remember well," Franklin writes in the description 
he gives of his father's character in his Autobiography, " his 
l)eing frequently visited by leading men, who consulted him 
for his opinion on public affairs, and those of the church he 
belonged to, and who showed a great respect for his judg- 
ment and advice." 

t " He had invented a short hand of his own," says Frank- 
lin in his life, speaking of his Uncle Benjamin, "which ho 
taught me ; but, not having practiced it, I have now forgot- 
ten it. He was very pious, and an assiduous attendant at 
the sermons of the best preachers, which he reduced to writ- 
ing according to his method, and had thus collected several 
volumes of them." 

t "My father was skilled a little in music. His voice was 
sonorous and agreeable, so that when he played on his violin, 
and sang withal, as. he Avas accustomed to do after the busi- 
ness of the day was over, it was extremely agreeable to hear." 
^—Franklin's Anfohiogrnphy. 



32 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

only when the air was blue with the faint light 
of the coming day. 

His first thoughts, on opening his eyes, were 
of the chastisement that he felt assured was in 
store for him if he staid till his father was stirring. 
So, without Avaiting to tidy himself, he crept, with 
his shoes in his hand, as silently as possible down 
stairs, and then slipping them on his feet, he was 
off, like a frightened deer, to the water-side. 

Come what might, little Ben was determined 
to be a sailor. 



CHAPTER n. 

"missing: a young gentleman — " 

^'- If Benjamin Franklin will return to his home^ 
all toill he for — " 

" No, no, I won't have '•forgiven^ put down," 
doggedly exclaimed the father, seizing hold of 
Uncle Benjamin's arm to stop his pen, as the lat- 
ter read out, word by word, the announcement 
he was busy writing for the town-crier : while, in 
one corner of the room, that important civic func- 
tionary stood waiting for the bit of paper, with 
his big bell inverted, so that it looked like an 
enormous brass tulip in his hand. 

" I ask your pardon. Master Frankling, but we 
general says ' forgiven' in all sitch cases," meekly 
observed the bellman, with a slight pull of his 
forelock. 

" Oh, Josiah, remember the words of your 
morning prayer !" interposed the broken-hearted 
mother, as for a moment she raised her face fi'om 
out her hands : " ' forgive us as we — ' you know 
the rest." 

"Ay, come. Josh," said Uncle Benjamin, "don't 



"mi^ssing: a young gentleman- 



33 



be stubborn-hearted ! Think of the young * nev- 
er-do-weir you were yourself when you were 
'prentice to brother John at Banbury."* 

" That's all very well !" murmured the Puritan 
tallow-chandler, turning away to hide the smiles 
begotten by the youthful recollection, and still 
struggling with the innate kindness of his nature ; 
" but I've got a duty to perform to my boy, and 
do it I will^ even if it breaks my heart." 

" Yes, but. Josh," remonstrated Uncle Ben, as 
he laid his hand on his brother's shoulder, *' think 
of the times and times you and I have stolen away 
on the sly to Northampton, to see the mummers 
there, unbeknown to father. Ah ! you were a sad 
young jackanapes for the play-house, that you 
were. Master Josh, at Ben's age," he added, 
nudging the father playfully in the side. 

"I don't mean to deny it, Benjamin" — and the 
would-be Brutus chuckled faintly as his brother 
reminded him of his boyish peccadilloes — " but," 
he added immediately afterward, screwing up as 
good a frown as he could manage under the cir- 
cumstances, " that's no reason why I should allow 
my boy to be guilty of the same sins. There, go 
along with you — f?c>," he exclaimed, good-humor- 
edly, as he endeavored to shake off both the moth- 
er and the uncle, who, seeing that the ice of pa- 
ternal propriety was fast thawing under the 
warmth of his better nature, had planted them- 
selves one on either side of him. " I tell you it's 
my bounden duty not to overlook the boy's dis- 

* "John, my next uncle, was bred a dyer, I believe, of 
wool," says Benjamin Franklin himself in his life. * * * 
"My grandfather Thomas, who was born in 1598, lived at 
Ecton till he was too old to continue his business, when he 
retired to Banbury in Oxfordshire, to the house of his son 
John, with whom my father served ctn apprenticeship." — See 
Autobiography^ p. 3 and 4. 

c 



34 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

obedience any longer;" and, so saying, he beat 
the air with his fist, as if anxious to hammer the 
notion into his own mind as well as theirs. 

" Verily, Josiah, justice says all should be pun- 
ished, ' for there are none perfect, no, not one,' '' 
whispered the religious wife impressively in his 
ear; "but love and mercy, husband, cry For- 
give." 

"To be sure they do," chimed in the good- 
natured uncle ; " for, as the mummers used to say 
in the play, Josh, ' If all have their deserts, who 
shall 'scape whipping ?' So, come, I may put 
down '-forgiven^ eh ?" added the peacemaker, as 
he shook his brother by the hand, while Josiah 
turned away as if ashamed of his weakness. " Ah ! 
I knew it 'ud be so," and quickly inditing the 
word. Uncle Benjamin handed the paper to the 
crier, saying, " There, my man, you'd better first 
go round the harbor with it ; and if you bring the 
prodigal back with you in an hour or two, why, 
you shall have a mug of cider over and above 
your pay." 

The crier, having nodded his head, and scraped 
his foot back along the sanded floor by way of 
obeisance, took his dej^arture, when in a minute 
or two the family heard his bell jangling away at 
the end of the street, and immediately afterward 
caught the distant cry of " Oyez, oyez, oyez ! hif 
Benjamin Frankling will return to his 'ome — " 

" Do you hear, sister ?" said Uncle Benjamin, 
consolingly, as he approached the weeping moth- 
er ; " your boy will be heard of all over the town, 
and you'll soon have your little jDet bird back 
again in his cage, rest assured." 

" Heaven grant it may be so, and bless you for 
your loving kindness, brother," faltered out the 
dame, half hysteric, through her tears, with de- 
light at the thought of regaining her lost son. 



"missing: a young gentleman — " 35 

" Hah ! it'll all come right enough by-and-by," 
said Uncle Benjamin, with a sigh like the blowing 
of a porpoise, as he now prepared to copy into his 
short-hand book the notes of the sermon he had 
heard on the previous evening, " and the young 
good-for-nothing will turn out to be the flow^er of 
the flock yet — take my word for it. Wasn't our 
brother Thomas the wildest of all us boys, Josh ? 
and didn't he come, after all, to be a barrister, and 
a great man ? And when Squire Palmer advised 
him to leave the forge, on account of his love of 
learning, and become a student at law, didn't fa- 
ther — you remember. Josh — vow he wouldn't lis- 
ten to it, and declare that the eldest son of the 
Franklins had always been a smith, and a smith, 
and nothing else than a smith, his eldest son 
should be ? Well," the good man proceeded, as 
he kept rubbing his spectacles with the dirty bit 
of wash-leather he usually carried in his pocket, 
" didn't Tom, I say, in spite of father's objections 
and prophecies, rise to be one of the foremost men 
in the whole county, and a friend of my Lord 
Halifax ?* ay, and so your Ben, mark my word, 

* "Thomas, my eldest uncle," wrote Franklin in 1771 to 
his son, William Temple Franklin, who was then Governor 
of New Jersey, "was bred a smith under his father" ("the 
eldest son being always brought ujd to that employment," he 
states in another place), "but being ingenious, and encour- 
aged in learning, as all his brothers were, by an Esquire 
Palmer, then the principal inhabitant of our parish, he qual- 
ified himself for the bar, and became a considerable man in 
the county, was chief mover of all public-spirited enterprises 
for the county or town of Northampton, as well as of his own 
village, of which many instances were related of him, and he 
was much taken notice of and patronized by my Lord Hali- 
fax. He died in 1702, four years to a day before I was born. 
The recital which some elderly persons made to us of his 
character, I remember, struck you as something extraordi- 
nary, from its similarity with what you know of me. ' Had 
he died,' said you, 'four years later, on the same day, one 



36 YOUNG BENJAMIN FBANKLIN. 

will come to be courted by the great some day ; 
for — though he's my oic7i godson, and called after 
me^ too — he's the very image of his iincle the bar- 
rister, that he is; so like him, indeed, that if 
Thomas, instead of dying, as he did four years to 
a day before Benjamin was born, had quitted this 
world for a better just four years later, why, I 
should have said — had I been a heathen, and be- 
lieved in such things — that the spirit of the one 
had passed into the body of the other ; for your 
Ben has got the same clever head-piece of his 
own, and is for all the world the same greedy 
glutton at a book." 

" I grant he's a lad of some parts," exclaimed 
the flattered father, while slipping on, over the 
arms of his coat, the clean linen sleeves his wife 
had put to air for him, " and, indeed, was always 
quick enough at his learning. But I'm wanted in 
the shop," he added, as the bell was heard to tin- 
kle without ; " so do you, Benjamin, talk it over 
with Abiah here, and please her mother's heart 
by raising her hopes of her truant child. Com- 
ing!" shouted the tallowy-chandler, as he ducked 
his head under the fringe of candles, while the 
impatient visitor kept tapping on the counter. 

As the husband left the parlor, the tidy wife 
cried in a half-whisper after him, " Do pray stop, 
Josiah, and put on a clean apron, for really that 
isn't lit to go into the shop with," and then, find- 
ing she had spoken too late, she turned to Uncle 
Benjamin (who was now scribbling away at the 
table), and continued, with all the glory of a 
mother's pride, " I can hardly remember the time 
when our Ben coidchiH read : how, too, the little 
fellow ever learned his letters was always a mys- 
tery to me, for I never knew of any one teaching 

might have supposed a transmigration.'" — Autobiographi/^ 
J3ohn's edition, p. 4. 



"missing: a young gentleman — " st 

him.* But I can't get Josiah to bear in mind 
that he was a boy himself once ; for, though Ben 
inay be a Httle flighty, I'm sure there's no vice 
in the child." 

And, now that her thoughts had been diverted 
into a more lively channel, she rose from her seat, 
and began to busy herself with making the apple 
and pumpkin pie that she had promised the chil- 
dren for that day's feast. 

"It was only a packman with tapes and rib- 
bons," said Josiah, as he shortly rejoined the 
couple ; " but even he had got hold of the news 
of our misfortune." 

" Well, but, Josiah," expostulated the brother, 
looking up sideways, like a bird, from the book in 
which he was writing, " don't you remember the 
time, man alive, when you used to walk over from 
Banbury to the smithy at Ectonf every week, and 
go nutting and birds'-nesting with us boys in Sy- 
well Wood, on God's-day, without ever setting 
foot in His house ? and do you recollect, too, how 
we boys 'ud carry off the old iron from the forge, 

* " My early readiness in learning to read," says our hero, 
in the account he gives of himself" (and which must have 
been very early, as I can not remember the time when I could 
not read), and the opinion of all friends that I should cer- 
tainly make a good scholar, encouraged him (my father) in 
this purpose of his — of putting me to the Church." — Frank- 
lin's Life, p. 7. 

t " Some notes which some of my uncles, who had some 
curiosity in collecting family anecdotes, once put into my 
hands, furnished me with several particulars relative to our 
ancestors. From these notes I learned that they lived in the 
village of Ecton, in Northamptonshire, on a freehold of about 
thirty acres, for at least 300 years, and how much longer 
could not be ascertained. This small estate would not have 
served for their maintenance without the business of a smith, 
which had continued in the family down to my uncle's time, 
the eldest son always being brought up to that employment 
— a custom which he and my father followed with regard to 
their eldest sons." — Life of Franklin, p. 2 and 3. 



38 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

and sell it to the traveling tinker, who used to 
come round with his cart once a month, and put 
up at the ' World's End' (that was the sign of the 
inn at Ecton, Abiah," he added, parenthetically, 
"and the half-way house between Northampton 
and Wellingborough, in Old England), and how 
we let father accuse Mat Wilcox — you remember 
old Mat — who was helping him at the forge then, 
of stealing his metal, without ever saying a word 
to clear the poor man ? Ah ! Josiah, Josiah, we 
can always see the mote in another's eye — " 

" Say no more, Ben," exclaimed the reproved 
brother ; " we are but weak vessels at best." 

"Now confess, husband," interruiDted the wife, 
as she continued rolling out the paste before her 
till it was like a sheet of buff leather, "isn't it bet- 
ter that I got you to sleep on your anger before 
punishing the poor lad ? It is but fright, after all, 
that has driven him from us; and when he re- 
turns, let me beg of you to use reason rather than 
the whip with him." 

"Yes, Abiah," dryly observed the husband, 
" ' Spare the rod,' and — " (he nodded his head as 
much as to say, " I needn't tell you the conse- 
quence") — " that is ever a woman's maxim." 

At this moment the side door opened stealthi- 
ly, and Deborah (dressed for the morning's work 
in a long checked pinafore reaching from the 
throat to the heels, so that the young woman look- 
ed like a great overgrown girl) thrust her head in 
the crevice, and gave her mother " a look" — one 
of those significant household glances which refer 
to a thousand and odd little family matters never 
intended for general ears. 

" You can come in now, Deborah," cried the 
mother, Avho, still engaged in the preparation of 
her apple and pumpkin pie, was busy thumbing 
patches of lard over the broad sheet of paste, and 



"missing: a young gentleman " 89 

converting it in appearance into a huge palette 
covered with dabs of white paint. " Have you 
finished all up stairs ?" she inquired, looking round 
for the moment. 

The girl, in her anxiety for her brother, did not 
stop to answer the question, but said in an under 
tone, as she drew close up to her mother's side, 
" Has father forgiven Ben ?" 

The dame, however, on her part, merely re- 
plied, " There, child, never mind about that just 
now ; you'll know all in good time," and imme- 
diately began to catechise her on her domestic 
duties. " Have you put a good fire in ' the keep- 
ing-room,' and sanded the floor nicely, and got out 
some more knives and forks for the children? 
for, remember, we shall sit down upward of a 
score to dinner to-day." 

But Deborah was too intent to listen to any 
thing but the fate of the boy, whom she loved 
better than all her brothers, for she had been al- 
lowed to nurse him when a baby, though but a 
mere child herself at the time, and had continued 
his toy-maker in general up to the present mo- 
ment. So she pulled her mother timidly by the 
apron, and said, as she glanced hastily at her fa- 
ther, to assure herself that he was still arguing 
with Uncle Benjamin, " Will father let him come 
back home ? have you found out where he's gone 
to yet ? and do you really think, mother, he's run 
away to sea?" adding the next minute, with a 
start, as the thought suddenly flashed upon her, 
" Oh dear me ! I quite forgot to tell you, mother, 
a man brought this letter to the side door, and 
said I was to deliver it privately to you." 

" What a head you have, child !" exclaimed the 
dame, as, dusting the flour from her hands, she 
snatched the note from the girl, and hastily tore 
it open. 



40 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

But her eye had hardly darted backward and 
forward over the first few lines before the mother 
littered a faint scream, and staggered back to the 
bee-hive chair. 

In a minute the husband and Uncle Benjamin 
were at her side, and Deborah, seizing the vine- 
gar cruet from the dresser-shelf, was bathing her 
mother's temples with the acid. 

" God be praised ! my boy's at Ruth's,*' the 
dame at length gasped out, in answer to the anx- 
ious group around her ; *' Holmes has sent a note 
here to say he will bring him round in the even- 
ing ;" and she pointed languidly to the letter which 
had fallen on the floor. 



CHAPTER in. 

THE FRANKLIN FAMILY. 

JosiAH Feanexin retained sufficient of the aus- 
tere habits of the Puritans and the early Non- 
conformists to have made it a rule — even if his 
limited means and large family (no fewer than 
thirteen of whom occasionally sat together at his 
table*) had not made it a matter of necessity — 
that the food partaken of by the little colony of 
boys and girls he had to support should be of the 
plainest possible description. Simple fare, how- 
ever, was so much a matter of principle with Jo- 
siah (despising, as he did, all " lusting after the 
flesh-pots"), that he never permitted at his board 

* * ' By his first wife my father had four children born in 
America (besides three previously in England)^ and by a sec- 
ond ten others — in all, seventeen — of whom I remember to 
have seen thirteen sitting together at his table, who all grew 
up to years of maturity, and were married." — Autobiographic,. 
p. 9. 



THE FRANKLIN FAMILY. 41 

any of those unseemly exhibitions of delight or 
disgust which certain youngsters are wont to in- 
dulge in on the entry of any, dish more or less 
toothsome than the well-known and ever-dreaded 
scholastic " stick-jaw."* 

In so primitive a household, therefore, there 
must have been some special cause for the com- 
pounding of so epicurean a dish as the before- 
mentioned apple and pumpkin pie — some extra- 
ordinary reason why Dame Franklin should have 
instructed Deborah, as she did, " to be sure and 
put out plenty of maple sugar for the children," 
besides "a gallon of the dried apples and peaches 
to be stewed for supper" — and why that turkey 
and those " canvas-back ducks" (so highly prized 
among the creature-comforts of America) were ere 
long twirhng away in front of the bright, cherry- 
red fire, and filling the whole house with their 
savory perfumef — and why, too, the brisket of 

* "Little or no notice was ever taken of what related to 
tlie victuals on the table — whether well or ill cooked — in or 
out of season — of good or bad flavoi' — preferable or inferior 
to this or that other thing of the kind ; so that I was brought 
up in such perfect inattention to these matters as to be quite 
indifferent what kind of food was set before me. Indeed, I 
am so unobservant of it, that to this day I can scarce tell, 
a few hours after dinner, of what dishes it consisted. This 
has been a great convenience to me in traveling, Avhen my 
companions have sometimes been very unhappy for want of 
a suitable gratification of their more delicate, because better 
instructed tastes and appetites." — Life of Fi-anklin, p. 9. 

t The white, or canvas-back duck, derives its name from 
the color of the feathers between the wings being of a light 
brown tint, like canvas. These birds breed on the borders 
of the great Northern lakes, and in winter frequent the Sus- 
quehanna and Potomac rivers, in order that they may feed 
on the bulbous root of a grass that grows on the fiats there, 
and which has much the flavor of celery. It is to the feed- 
ing on this root that the peculiarly delicious flavor of their 
flesh is attributed. They are held in as great esteem in 
America as grouse with us, and are frequently sent as a 



43 TOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

corned beef had been got up from " the cask" be- 
low, and was now wabbling and steaming, with 
its dozen of dough-nuts bumjDing against the lid 
of the iron pot on the hob, and the corn-cakes 
baking in the oven, and the huge bowl of curds — 
white and cold-looking as marble — standing on 
the dresser. 

Why all this preparation for feasting in a house 
where the ordinary food was almost as frugal as 
a hermit's fare ? 

The Franklin family knew but one holiday in 
the course of the year — the anniversary of the fa- 
ther's safe landing in America in 1685, which the 
pious Josiah had made a family "Thanksgiving 
Day." To commemorate this event, the younger 
girls (those who had not yet finished their school- 
ing) came home from their maiden aunts, Hannah 
and Patience Folger, who kept a day-school at 
Sherbourne, in [N'antucket ; while the boys who 
were out in the world, serving their apprentice- 
ship, got leave to quit their master's house for the 
day, to take part in the family festival ; and the 
grown-up sons, who were in business for them- 
selves, gave over their work, or shut up their 
stores, and came with their wives and little ones 
to join in the rejoicing. 

So sacred a duty, indeed, did all the Franklins 
regard it, to assemble once a year under the pa- 
ternal roof, that none but the most cogent excuse 
for absence was ever urged or received, so that 
even those who were away in distant lands strove 
to return in time for the general meeting. 

The morning was not far advanced, and Josiah 

present for hundreds of miles. A canvas-back duck, indeed, 
is reckoned one of the greatest dainties in the States, being 
more delicate in flavor than a wild duck, though consider- 
ably larger. The Americans eat it with currant jelly, as if 
it were venison. 



THE FRANKLIN" FAMILY. 43 

had hardly done putting up the shutters of his 
store, as was his wont on this day precisely at ten 
in the forenoon, before the boys and the girls, and 
the grown-up young men and women of the fam- 
ily, began to swarm in like so many bees at the 
sound of a gong. 

First came Jabez and Nehemiah — two stout, 
strapping lads, carpenter's and mason's appren- 
tices (the one had called for the other on his road), 
dressed in their Sunday three-cornered hats and 
bright yellow leather breeches, and with their 
thick shoes brown with the earth of the plowed 
fields they had trudged over, and carrying in their 
hands the new walking-sticks they had cut from 
the copse as they came along. 

Then young Esther and Martha made their ap- 
pearance, wrapped in their warm scarlet cloaks, 
and looking like a pair of "little Red Riding- 
Hoods" — for they had come from school at Nan- 
tucket, and had been brought to the door by the 
mate of the New York sloop that plied between 
Long Island and Boston, touching at the inter- 
vening islands on the way once a month in those 
days. Under their cloaks they carried a bundle 
containing the long worsted mittens they had 
knitted for the mother, and the warm patchwork 
quilt they had made for the father, together with 
the highly-prized samplers of that time, the latter 
of which had been done expressly to be framed 
for the keeping-room. 

After these walked in John Franklin, the tal- 
low-chandler (who was just about to set up in 
Rhode Island), with his young Quakeress wife on 
his arm ; and then followed the married daughter, 
Abiah, and her husband, the trader in furs and 
beaver-skins, who had always an inexhaustible 
stock of stories to tell the children about the 
Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians, including wild 



U YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

tales of the chiefs " Blue Snake" or " Big Bear," 
or even Nekig the " Little Otter." 

Nor did Zachary, the ship-builder (he who had 
sent the ducks from the Potomac River), absent 
hunself, even though he had to come all the way 
from Annapolis for the gathering ; and he brought 
with him his motherless little boy, for his young 
wife had died of the fever since the last family 
meeting. 

There was Ebenezer, too, the bachelor farmer ; 
and the swarthy and stalwart Thomas, the first- 
born and hereditary smith of the family; and 
Ruth, with her half dozen little ones toddling close 
after her, like a hen with her brood of chicks ; and 
Samuel Franklin, Uncle Benjamin's son from Lon- 
don, who had recently set up as a cutler in Boston 
city; and, indeed, every one of the Franklins that 
could by any means manage to reach the house at 
the time. 

Only three out of the multitudinous family were 
absent : James, the printer, who had gone to Lon- 
don to purchase a stock of types — Josiah, the out- 
cast — and Benjamin, the little runaway. 

The absence of the elder brothers created no 
astonishment ; for Josiah had not sat at that board 
for years — many of the young children, indeed, 
had never set eyes on his countenance — while all 
had heard of James's trip to the mother country. 
But where was Ben? where was Ben? was the 
general cry, as the family came streaming in, one 
after another. 

Jabez and Nehemiah ran all over the house, 
shouting after the little fellow. Esther and Mar- 
tha, too, kept teasing Deborah all the morning to 
tell them where he had got to, for they fancied 
he was hiding from them in play, and they were 
itching to show him the little sailor's Guernsey 
frock they had knitted for him at school. John 



THE FRANKLIN FA3IILY. 45 

wished to hear how the lad got on at candle- 
making, and whether he could manage the dips 
yet, and Zachary to see what new toy-ship he had 
got on the stocks — and, indeed, every one to say 
something to him ; for he was a general favorite, 
not only because he was the youngest of the boys, 
but because he was the cleverest and best-natured 
of them all. 

The news that Ben was " in disgrace" made all 
as sad as death for a time ; but every one had a 
kind word to say for him to the father. The 
younger ones begged hard for him; the elder 
ones pleaded well for him ; so that Josiah had not 
fortitude enough to hold out against such a frieird- 
ly siege, and was obliged to promise he would let 
the boy off as lightly as possible ; though, true 
to his principles, the would-be disciplinarian vowed 
that the next time " he'd — he'd — but they should 



Mistress Franklin (as the sons and daughters 
came pouring in one after another, till the house 
was so full of boys and girls — children and grand- 
children — that it was almost impossible, as has 
been well said, to shut the doors for them) had 
enough to do between preparing the dinner and 
tidying the young ones for the occasion ; though 
it almost broke her housewife's heart to find how 
buttonless and stringless, and even ragged, their 
clothes had become during their long absence. 

Scarcely had she kissed the boys before she 
twisted them round by the shoulders, as she eyed 
them from top to toe, and commenced pouring 
down upon their unlucky heads a heavy shower 
of motherly reproofs, while the lads, who were 
thinking only of the feast, kept worrying her as 
to what she was going to give them for dinner. 

" Dear heart !" she would begin to one, " why 



46 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

donH you wash up at the roots of your hair, boy?" 
or else she would exclaim, as she threw up her 
hands and eyebrows, "Is that your best coat? 
Why, you've only had it a year, and it's not fit to 
be seen. Where you fancy the clothes come from, 
lad, is more than I can tell." 

The boy, however, would merely reply, "What 
pie have you made this year, mother? I hope 
it's a big 'un ! Let's have a peep in the oven — 
you might as well." 

Then to another she would cry, as she seized 
him by his leg like a sheep, " Why, I declare, 
there's a large hole in the heel of your stocking, 
boy, big enough for a rat to get through ; and if 
you were a sweep's child, I'm sure your linen 
couldn't well be blacker." 

But this one paid no more heed than the other 
to the dame's observations ; for the only answer 
he made was, " Got any honey, mother, for after 
dinner? Don't the ducks smell jolly, Jabe — 
that's all ! I say, mother, give us a sop in the 
pan." 

Nor did the girls undergo a less minute scru- 
tiny. " Why didn't a big child like Esther write 
home and say she wanted new flannels, for those 
she'd on were enough to perish her. She never 
saw children grow so in all her life." 

" Come here, girl ; whatever is the matter with 
your mouth?" next she would shriek, as she 
caught hold of Martha and dragged her to the 
light ; " you want a good dosing of nettle-tea to 
sweeten your blood — that you do." Whereupon, 
heaving a deep sigh, she would add, " Hah ! you 
must all of you, children, have a spoonful or two 
of nice brimstone and treacle before you leave 
home again." 

Then, as soon as the dame caught sight of Ruth, 
she began to question Aer about poor little Ben, 



THE FRANKLIN FAMILY. 4T 

continuing her cooking operations the while. At 
one moment she was asking whether the lad was 
fretting much, and the next she was intent on 
basting her ducks, declaring that there was no 
leaving them a minute, or she'd have them burnt 
to a cinder. 

Now she would fall to stirring the potful of 
" hominy," and skimming the corned beef; then 
pausing for an instant to tell Ruth how frighten- 
ed she had been when she found that poor Ben- 
had left the house that morning, and begging of 
her to get Holmes to do all he could to set the 
lad against the sea. 

And when Ruth had told the mother that 
Holmes was obliged to stay and see his cargo dis- 
charged at the wharf, and that he thought it 
would save words if Ben came round with him 
in the evening ; and when she had informed her, 
moreover, that Ben had forgotten it was Thanks- 
giving Day at home till he saw her and her little 
ones leaving for the feast, and that then he seem- 
ed to take it to heart greatly, the mother stopped 
short in her examination of the pie during the 
process of baking, and cried, as she held it half 
drawn out of the oven, " I'll put by a bit of every 
thing for him, and he shall have the largest cut 
of the pie, that he shall ;" adding the next min- 
ute, " But he'll be round in the evening in time 
for the stewed fruit and corn-cakes — bless him !" 

Immediately after this she began wondering 
again whether that girl Deborah had thought 
about tapping a fresh cask of cider, and "fuss- 
ing," as usual, now about her boy, and then about 
her dinner. 



48 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKXIN. 



CHAPTER IV. 

THE FEAST, AND AN ARKIVAL. 

When all the family had assembled in the 
" keeping-room," it was the invariable custom of 
the Puritan father on this day to offer up a pray- 
er of thanksgiving for his safe arrival in New En- 
gland ; after which the violin was taken out, and 
he would play while the family joined in a hymn. 
This was usually followed by a short discourse 
from Josiah touching the great principles of re- 
ligious liberty, so dear to the early settlers of 
America ; for the sturdy old Non-conformist loved 
to impress upon the children gathered round him 
that he had left the home where his forefathers 
had lived for many generations, not to seek 
"treasures that moth and rust corrode," but 
merely to be able to worship the Almighty as he 
thought fit, and which w^as held to be a crime at 
that time in his native land.* 

* *'My father married young, and carried his wife with 
three children to New England about 1685. The conven- 
ticles being, at that time, forbidden by law, and frequently 
disturbed in the meetings, some considerable men of his ac- 
quaintance determined to go to that country, and he was 
persuaded to accompany them thither, where they expected 
to enjoy the exercise of their religion with freedom. * * * 
Our humble family early embraced the Reformed religion," 
writes Benjamin Franklin. ' ' Our forefathers had an English 
Bible, and to conceal it, and place it in safety, it was fasten- 
ed open with tapes under and within the cover of a joint- 
stool. When my great-grandfather wished to read it to his 
family, he placed the joint-stool on his knees, and then turn- 
ed over the leaves under the tapes. One of the children 
stood at the door to give notice if he saw the apparitor com- 
ing, who was an officer of the Spiritual Court. . . . This an- 



THE FEAST, AND AN ARRIVAL. 49 

The family devotions and discourse were bare- 
ly ended ere the " cuckoo clock" whooped twelve, 
and immediately a crow of delight from the 
younger branch of the Franklin family announced 
the entry of the corned beef and dough-nuts. 

Such manifestations of the pleasures of the 
palate, we have before said, were highly disap- 
proved of by the simple-minded Josiah ; so, as 
his eye suddenly lighted upon the young carpen- 
ter's apprentice in the act of rubbing his waist- 
coat, and drawing in his breath in youthful ecsta- 
sy, the ascetic father cried, with a shake of the 
head, 

" Jabez, how often have I told you that this 
giving way to carnal joys is little better than a 
heathen !" 

But scarcely had the parent finished chiding 
one son than he was startled by a^loud smacking 
of the lips from another ; when, glancing in the 
direction of the sound, he found the young mason 
Avith his mouth and eyes wide open, in positive 
raptures as he sniffed the savory odor of the 
brown and smoking canvas-back 'ducks that Deb- 
orah was about to j)lace at the bottom of the 
table. 

" I'm ashamed of you, Nehemiah," the tallow- 
chandler shouted, as he frowned at the lad, " giv- 
ing up your heart to the vanities of this world in 
such a manner !" 

A secret pull at his coat-tails, however, from 
Uncle Benjamin, cut short the lecture, for the 

ecdote," Franklin adds, "I had from Uncle Br^njamin. The 
family continued, " he then proceeds to say, "all of the Church 
of England till about the end of Charles II. 's reign, when 
some of the ministers who had been ' outed' for their non- 
conformity having opened a conventicle in Northamptonshire, 
my uncle Benjamin and my father adhered to them, and so 
continued all their lives.'' — Franklhi's Autobiography^ p. 5. 



50 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

father knew that the friendly hmt meant to im- 
ply, "It's only once a year, Josh !" 

At length the dinner was ended, grace said, and 
a button or two of the boys' waistcoats undone ; 
and then the table itself was got out of the way, 
and the games commenced. 

This, however, was a part of the entertainment 
that the seriously-inclined Josiah was but little 
given to-; and, indeed, it required some more of 
Uncle Ben's good-humored bantering before he 
could be induced to consent to it. Even then he 
insisted that the children should play at "Mas- 
ters and Men," because there was a certain 
amount of knowledge to be gained from the rep- 
resentations of the various trades ; for nothing- 
annoyed him more than to see youth wasting its 
time in mere idle amusements. 

But, the ice of propriety once broken. Uncle 
Ben and the cRildren were soon engaged in the 
most boisterous and childish gambols : not only 
was "dropping the 'kerchief" indulged in, and 
the grave Josiah himself made to form part in the 
ring, but even tiie wild frolic of "jingling" was 
resorted to, and the father and mother, and Un- 
cle Ben, and Zachary the ship-builder, and Ruth 
too, as well as young Abiah and her husband the 
trapper, and John and his young Quakeress wife, 
and, indeed, the entire company, were all pressed 
into the service, and every one of them blindfold- 
ed at the same time, while the part of " jingler" 
fell to the lot of Nehemiah, who ran about the 
keeping-room like a frantic young town crier, 
ringing the hand-bell to give notice of his where- 
abouts to the blind players, as they kept rolling 
continually one over the other in their eagerness 
to catch him. 

It was at this moment, when the noise and 



THE FEAST, AND AN ARRIVAL. 51 

madness of the sport had reached their greatest 
height, and the father and Uncle Benjamin lay 
flat upon the floor, with a miscellaneous mound of 
children and grandchildren piled on top of them, 
that James Franklin — the young printer, who had 
gone to London for a stock of types and presses 
— burst into the room, fresh from the vessel that 
had just dropped anchor in the bay, and with his 
arms laden with packets of presents for the sev- 
eral members of the family. 

" Here's brother James come back from Old 
England !" shouted Nehemiah, throwing away his 
bell. 

In an instant the bandages were torn from all 
the faces, and the half-ashamed father dragged 
from under the bodies struggling on top of him, 
the newly-arrived son laughing heartily the while. 

As the children, and the grown brothers, and 
the rest came scrambling up to kiss or shake 
hands with the printer on his return, he told them 
one after the other the gift he had brought them 
from the " old country ;" and when he had greet- 
ed the whole of the company present, he stared 
round and round, and then glancing at Josiah, 
cried, " But where's Httle Ben, father ?" 

Josiah averted his head, for he had no wish to 
mar the general happiness by again alluding to 
his boy's disgrace, while the mother shook her 
head significantly at the printer, and Uncle Ben- 
jamin gave him a secret kick. 

James knew by the pantomimic hints that 
something was amiss ; so he answered, " What ! 
not allowed to be present on Thanksgiving Day ? 
Surely, father, one outcast in the family is 
enough !" 

" There, say nothing about it, lad," cried Uncle 
Ben ; " it's all been looked over long ago, and the 
little fellow will be here to supper shortly. But 



52 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

come, let's have the news, Master James. You 
went down to Ecton, of course ?" he added ; and 
the young man had scarcely signified that he had 
made the journey, when the father and uncle, 
anxious to know all about their native village, 
and the companions of their youth, fired ofl[' such 
a volley of questions that it was more than James 
could do to answer them fast enough. 

Had he been to the old smithy ? inquired one ; 
and had he got a slip of the " golden pip2)in"-tree 
in the orchard ? 

Was Mistress Fisher still living at the forge ? 
asked the other; and who carried on the busi- 
ness now that their brother Thomas's son was 
dead? 

" Dear ! dear !" they both cried, as they heard 
the answer, "the smithy sold to Squire Isted, 
the lord of the manor,* and the old forge pulled 
down ? Well ! well ! what changes do come to 
pass !" 

Next it was, How was their new German king, 
George I., liked by the people at home ? And 
did he go and have a mug of ale at the " World's 
End?" and did Dame Blason keep the old inn 
still? Did he go to meeting, too, at the N"orth- 
ampton Conventicle, and learn whether the 
" Brownists" were increasing in numbers round 
about ? and was old Luke Fuller, who was " out- 
ed" for non-conformity at the time when they 
themselves seceded from the Church, the minister 
there still ? 

And when James had replied that the good 
man had dej^arted this life two years come Mich- 

* "My grandfather's eldest son, Thomas, lived in the 
house at Ecton, and left it, with the land, to his only daugh- 
ter, who, with her husband, one Fisher, of Wellingborough, 
sold it to Mr. Isted, now lord of the manor." — Life of Frank- 
lin, p. 3. 



THE FEAST, AND AN ARRIVAL. 53 

aelmas, the old people hung down their heads as 
they sighed, " Hah ! it will be our turn soon." 

Then they wanted to know, Were the rebels in 
Scotland all quiet when he left ? and had he been 
over to Banbury, and seen the dye-house, and had 
John Franklin still got the best of the business 
there ? 

Had he set eyes on their old schoolfellow, Reu- 
ben of the Mill ? and was old Ned, the traveling 
butcher, still alive? And who held the "hund- 
red-acre farm" of the young Lord Halifax now ? 
And did the Non-conformists seem contented 
with the " Toleration Act ?" and was there any 
stir among them about getting the " Corporation 
Act" repealed ? And was Squire Palmer's widow 
living at the Hall still? And had he been over 
and seen the folk at Earls-Barton and Mears- 
Ashby, and told them that they were all doing 
well in New. England? Hah! they would give 
the world to set eyes on the old places and the 
old people again. 

The gossip about their native village and an 
cient friends would have continued, doubtlessly, 
until bedtime, had not Jabez, who had a turn for 
that extravagant pantomime which boys consider 
funny, here danced wildly into the room after the 
style of the Red Indians that his brother-in-law 
the trapper had just been telling them about, and 
springing into the air with a cry imitative of the 
war-whoop, announced to the startled company 
that the "Big Bear" and "Little Otter" were 
coming up the stairs to join the party. 

Whereupon Captain Holmes and the truant 
Benjamin entered the room. 



54 yOUKG BEisJAM12^ i'KAXKLIN. 



CHAPTER V. 

THK father's LKCTUKE. 

" Come this way, Benjamin ! I wish to speak 
with you below," said the father, gravely, as soon 
as the lad had gone the round of his relatives, 
and just at the interesting moment when the "car- 
nal-minded" Jabez was making Ben's mouth wa- 
ter with a list of the many good things they had 
had for dinner that day. 

The paternal command caused no little excite- 
ment among the youthful members of the family, 
who knew too well what the summons meant. 

But scarcely had Josiah removed one of the 
lighted candles from the mantle-shelf to carry 
Avith him to the parlor, than the mother rose and 
followed close at the heels of the father and the 
chap-fallen boy ; while Jabez and Nehemiah nudg- 
ed one another aside, as they whispered, " Let's 
come too, and see what father's going to do with 
Ben." 

To satisfy their curiosity, the anxious lads avail- 
ed themselves of the darkness of the shop, where 
they stood, quiet as mutes, peejDing over the cur- 
tain into the little back room, and watching the 
movements of their parents Avithin. 

" Father's lecturing him xcell^ I can see," whis- 
pered Jabez, on tiptoe, to the brother at his side, 
" for he is shaking his head till his gray locks fly 
about again, and liolding up his forefinger as he 
always does, you know, Avhen he's talking very 
seriously." 

" What's mother doim? ?" asked the brother. 




•Fathers lecturing him well, I can see. 



THE father's lecture. 57 

" Why, she's got Ben drawn close np to her, 
and keeps passing her hand over his cheek," an. 
swered Jabez. " How aged father gets to look, 
doesn't he?" the boy added, almost in the same 
breath, for he could not help remarking the 
change, now that his whole attention was riveted 
on his i3arent's figure. " He's got to stoop dread- 
fully since last Thanksgiving Day." 

" Yes," observed the other, " that Sunday gray 
coat of his, that he's had ever since I can remem- 
ber, gets to hang about him like a smock-frock, 
that it does. I was thinking so only just before 
dinner, Jabe." 

" Ah ! and mother isn't so young as she used 
to be," mournfully continued Jabez, " for she gets 
to look more like old grandfather Folger in the 
face every — " 

" What's that noise ?" whispered Nehemiah, as 
a loud scuffle was heard in the parlor. 

" Why, father's just dragged Benjamin from 
mother's arms," was the answer, " for she kept 
hugging and kissing him all the time he was lec- 
turing him. Hush ! I shall hear what he says 
directly, for he's talking much louder now." 

"What's he telling him, eh?" inquired the 
young mason, in an under tone, after holding his 
breath till he felt half stifled with his suspense. 

" I can just make out that he's very angry with 
mother for petting Ben as she does," replied the 
little carpenter, "because father says 'it makes 
his conduct appear undeservedly harsh, and strips 
his reproofs' — yes, those were his words — ' of all 
the force that justice would otherwise give them.' 
Isn't that like father, Nee ?" 

" Yes," added the brother ; " he may be a little 
severe at times, but he's always very just with us, 
I'm sure ; and mother, you know, loill spoil Ben, 
because he's the youngest of us boys." 



5S YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

"Be quiet, Nee !" said Jabez, as he kicked his 
brother gently to enforce the command, and put 
his ear closer to the door. " Father's saying now 
that if Ben doesn't like the candle-making — yes" 
— and the lad paused to catch the remainder of 
the speech — "he'll let him choose a trade for 
himself What do you think of that .^" 

" Why, that comes of Uncle Benjamin being 
here," interposed Xehemiah. " Uncle's been hav- 
ing a long talk with father aboufr the matter, I 
can see." 

" Do be quiet, will you, or I shall miss it all," 
cried Jabez, tetchily. " What's that he's sapng 
now ?" the lad inquired, talking to himself, as he 
strove to catch the words. "Father's warning 
Ben," he added, in measured sentences, as he fol- 
lowed the old man's voice, " that when he's chosen 
another trade — if he ever runs away from his 
work again — he'll close his doors against him 
forever, the same as he did with his outcast son 
Josiah." 

An hour or two after the above scene, the three 
boys, fresh from their sujjper of stewed peaches 
and hot corn-cakes (of which the mother had 
given her pet boy Ben double allowance), had 
retired to the little attic for the night, and when 
Jabez and Nehemiah had heard from their broth- 
er all about his running away, and the wonderful 
" Flying Dutchman" (clipper built) that he'd got 
nearly ready for launching, they began to gossip 
among themselves, as boys are wont to do, while 
they prepared for bed. 

First, Ben's Guinea-pig was taken out, and ex- 
hibited to the admiring brothers, who, boy-like, 
were young "fanciers," not only of Guinea-j^igs, 
but of every pet animal in creation, from white 
mice to monkeys ; whereupon they immediately 



commenced discussing the comparative beauties 
of the "black," the "tortoise-shell," and the 
" fawn" kinds of African porkers, one saying that 
" too many tea-leaves Avere not good for them, as 
they made them pot-bellied," and the other re- 
marking that " he didn't like Guinea-pigs because 
they ate their young like rabbits ;" a circumstance 
Avhich suddenly reminded him of a " double-smut" 
of his acquaintance that " had devoured her whole 
litter of six, every bit of them except their tails, 
but those she couldn't swallow because they w^ere 
so fluify." 

This led to a long discourse on rabbits in gen- 
eral, w^hen Jabez dived very learnedly into the 
varieties of " double-lops," and " horn-lojDS," and 
" oar-lops," as well as the " up-eared" sj^ecies, and 
told tales of wonderful does, the tips of whose 
" fancy ears" had touched the ground, and meas- 
ured more than a foot in length. 

After this the conversation branched off to 
pigeons, young Benjamin observing that if Jabe 
would only make him a "snap-trap," he'd keep 
some " tumblers" in their loft, for Captain Holmes 
had just brought Bobby a couple of beautiful 
"soft -billed almonds" from London; besides, 
there was a prime place for a pigeon-house against 
their melting-shed, and a schoolfellow of his at 
old Brownell's had promised to give him a pair 
of splendid-hooded " Jacobins" and some " Leg- 
horn runts" for stock directly he'd got a place to 
keep them in, so Jabe might as well make a house 
for him in his over-time. 

Presently the young carpenter and mason pro- 
ceeded to compare notes as to the strength of the 
" sky-blue," and the thickness of the butter on 
the " scrape" at their respective masters, and to 
talk of the Avivos of those gentlemen as " old 
Mother So-and-So," until, tired of this subject, 



60 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the youthful trio digressed into ghost-stories, and 
so frightened each other with their hobgoblin 
tales, that, as the candle sputtered and flickered 
in the socket, they trembled at every rattle of the 
window-sashes, till sleep put an end to their ter- 
rors and their talk. 

At length the morning arrived when the youn- 
ger branches of the Franklin family were to re- 
turn to their masters and mistresses, and then the 
dame was in the same flurry as on the day of 
their arrival with the preparation of the hundred 
and one things required at her hands. 

On the table before her lay a small lot of brown, 
worsted stockings done up into balls that resem- 
bled so many unwashed potatoes, and new can- 
vas smocks for the boys to work in (short as ba- 
bies' shirts), and new shoes too, the soles of which 
were studded with nails almost as big as those 
on a church door, as Avell as mobcaps, and tip- 
pets, and aprons for the girls, after the style of 
our charity children of the present day, and hanks 
of worsted yarn for knitting, and seed-cakes, and 
bags of spiced nuts, together with ajar of honey 
for each of them, besides a packet of dried herbs 
to be made into tea, to " j^urify their blood" at 
the spring and fall of the year. 

When, too, the dreaded liour of departure ar- 
rived, and the boys' bundles had been made up, 
and the girls' hand-baskets ready packed for the 
journey, the tears of the mother and little ones 
rolled down their cheeks as fast and big as hail- 
stones down a skylight; and, as the weeping 
children crossed the threshold, the eager dame 
stood on the door-step, watcliing them down the 
narrow street, and calling after them to remind 
them of an infinity of small things they were to 
be sure and do directly they reached their des- 
tination. 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 61 

Ben, too, on his part, kept shouting to Jabez 
" not to forget to make him the pigeon-liouse as 
soon as he could get the wood," and calUng to the 
young mason to remember to send him some 
prime " bonces" and " alleys" directly he got back 
to the stone-yard. 



CHAPTER YI. 

A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 



On the evening after the Thanksgiving Day 
Captain Holmes came round, when they had 
" knocked off work" at the ship, to smoke his 
pipe with Josiah and Uncle Benjamin— for the 
father w^ished the captain to talk with young Ben 
about his love of the sea ; so the dame had made 
one of her famous bowls of" lambs'-wool" for the 
occasion. . 

The captain Tvas a marked contrast, both m 
form and feature, to Josiah and his brother Ben- 
jamin. His frame seemed, indeed, to be of cast 
iron, his chest being broad as a bison's, and the 
grip of his big, hard hand like the squeeze of a 
vice. His face was gipsy-bronze with the weath- 
er he had long been exposed to, and set in ^ 
horseshoe of immense black whiskers, the hair of 
which stood out from the cheeks on either side 
like a couple of sweep's brushes ; and between 
these his white teeth glistened like the pearly 
lining of an oyster-shell as he laughed, which he 
did continually, and almost without reason. 

The old men, on the other hand, were but the 
noble ruins of humanity, graced rather than dis- 
figured by age. At the time of the opening of 
our story Josiah was in his sixty-third year, and 
Uncle Benjamin some few years his senior ; and 



63 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

yet neither gave signs of the approach of that 
second childhood which is but the return of the 
circle of life into itself, linking the graybeard with 
the infant, and foreshadowing the Eternal in that 
mysterious round which brings us back (if the 
furlough from above be but long enough) to the 
very babyhood from which w^e started. 

The red Saxon blood, as contradistinguished 
from the swarthier Norman sap inherent in En- 
glish veins, was visible in the cheeks of both of 
the old men; indeed, their complexion was so 
pinky that one could well understand their boast 
that "they had never known a day's illness in 
their lives ;"* while their fresh color contrasted as 
pleasantly with their silver-white hair as the crim- 
son light of a blacksmith's forge glowing amid 
the snow of a winter's day. The only sign that 
the brothers gave of age was a slight crooking of 
the back, like packmen bending beneath their load 
— of years ; for their teeth were still perfect, nei- 
ther was the mouth drawn in, nor were the cheeks 
hollowed with the capacious dimples of second 
childhood. 

Had it not been for the " sad color" and formal 
Quaker-like cut of their clothes, no one Avould 
have fancied that they belonged to that heroic 
and righteous body of men, who, following in the 
footsteps of the first " pilgrims" to America, had 
willingly submitted to the martyrdom of exile for 
the sake of enjoying the free exercise of their re- 
ligion; for the hale and hearty Josiah had the 
cheerful and contented look of the English yeo- 
man, while the more portly and dumpy Benjamin 
had so good-humored an air that he might have 

* "I never knew my father or mother to have any sick- 
ness but that of which they died — he at 89, and she at 8.5 
years of age." — Antobiographt/, p. 9. 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 63 

been mistaken, in another suit, for the jolly land- 
lord of a roadside inn.* 

Mistress Franklin, being some dozen years 
younger than her husband, and looking even 
younger than she was, seemed barely to have 
reached the summit of life's hill rather than to 
have commenced her journey down it. True, a 
quick eye might have discovered just a filament 
or two of silver streaking the dark bands of hair 
that braided her forehead ; but these were merely 
the hoar-frosts of Autumn whitening the spider's 
threads, for as yet there was no trace of Winter 
in her face. 

At the first glance, however, there was a half 
masculine look about the dame that made her 
seem deficient in the softer qualities of feminine 
grace ; for her features, though regular, were too 
bold and statuesque to be considered beautiful in 
a woman, and yet there was such exquisite ten- 
derness — indeed, a i3laintiveness that was almost 
musical — in her voice, together with such a good 
expression, glowing like sunshine over her whole 
countenance, that the stranger soon felt as assured 
of her excellence as those even who had proved it 
by long acquaintance. 

The wife, too, belonged to the same Puritan 
stock as Josiah ; her father — " Peter Folger, of 
Sherbourne," in Nantucket — having been among 
the earliest pilgrims to New England, and being 
styled " a godly and learned Englishman" in the 
chronicles of the country.f 

* *'I suppose you may like to know what kind of a man 
my father was," says Benjamin Franklin in writing to his 
son. "He had an excellent constitution, was of a middle 
stature, well set, and very strong." 

t "My mother (the second wife of my father) was Abiah 
Folger, daughter of Peter Folger, one of the first settlers of 
New England, of whom honorable mention is made by Cot- 
tnn Mather in his ecclesiastical history of that country, en- 



C4 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

The simplicity of her dress, however, consti- 
tuted the chief mark of her conventicle training. 
The main characteristic of her appearance was 
the immaculate cleanliness as well as the fastidi- 
ous neatness of her attire. There was so much of 
white, indeed, about her (what with the mobcap, 
the muslin kerchief crossed over her bosom, and 
the ample linen apron covering her skirt (that she 
always looked fresh and tidy as a dairy — snowy 
as suds themselves. Her dress, too, was as free 
as a moonlight scene from all positive color, for 
even the mere fillet of ribbon which she wore 
round her cap was black, and her stuff' gown it- 
self gray as a friar's garment. 

" I've been pointing out to the youngster here, 
father," proceeded the captain, as he punctuated 
his speech with the puffs of his pipe, when the 
subject of the evening's conversation had been 
fairly broached, " what a dog's life a sailor's is, 
and asking him how he'd like to live all his time 
upon maggoty biscuits and salt junk, that goes 
by the name of ' mahogany' aboard a ship — be- 
cause it's so hard and red, and much easier carved 
into chess-men than it's chewed and digested, I 
can tell you. I've been asking him, too, how 
he'd like to have to drink Avater that's as black 
and putrid, ay ! and smells, while it's being pump- 
ed out of the casks in the hold, as strong as if it 
was being drawn out of a cesspool, so that one's 
glad to strain it through the corner of his hand- 
kerchief while drinking it from the ' tots.' And, 
what's more, youngster, you'd get only short al- 
lowance of this stuff*, I can tell you ; for over and 
over again, when I was a boy aboard the ' Francis 

titled Magnalia Cliristi Americana, as ' a podly and learned 
Englishman,' if I remember the words rightly." — Life of 
Franklin, p. G. 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 65 

Drake,' I give you my word I've been that dry in 
the tropics (what with the salt food, that was like 
munching solid brine, and the sun right overhead 
like a red-hot warming-pan) that I've drunk the 
sea-water itself to moisten my mouth, till I've 
been driven nearly mad with the burning fury of 
the thirst that was on me. Ah ! you youngsters, 
Ben, little know what we sailors have to put up 
with ; for, mind you, lad, I'm not pitching you 
any stiff yarn here about wrecks, and being cast 
away on rafts, and drawing lots as to who's to be 
devoured by the others, but what I'm telling you 
is the simple every-day life of the seaman, ay ! and 
of half the ' reefers,' too." 

Here the captain paused to indulge in his habit- 
ual chuckle (for it was all the same to him whether 
the subject in hand was serious or comic), while 
Mistress Franklin looked perfectly horror-stricken 
at the account of the water her boy had been, as 
it were, just on the point of drinking. 

Little Ben himself, however, was not yet " at 
home" enough to make any remark, but sat on the 
stool at his mother's feet, with his eyes counting 
the grains of sand on the floor, for he was still 
ashamed to meet his father's gaze. 

As for Josiah, he was but little moved by the 
captain's picture of the miseries of seafaring, and 
merely observed that, as he had taught his chil- 
dren to abstain from hankering after the "flesh- 
pots," Ben could bear the absence of creature 
comforts better than most boys — a remark that 
set the captain chuckling again in good earnest. 

" What you say, father, about hankering after 
the 'flesh-pots' is all very well," continued the 
good-humored sailor, as he tittered, while he tap- 
ped the ashes from the bowl of his pipe; "but if 
you'd had a twelvemonth on mahogany and sea- 
biscuits as hard and dry as tiles, you yourself 
E 



C6 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

would get hankering after a bit of ' soft tommy' 
(that's our name for new bread, Ben), and a cut 
of roast beef, I'll be boimd ; ay ! ay ! and think 
the fat old bum-boat woman, that comes off to 
the ship with a cargo of fresh quartern loaves di- 
rectly you make the land, the loveliest female in 
all creation. But," added Captain Holmes, after a 
long pull at a fresh mug of the delicious " lambs'- 
wool," " there are worse things aboard a ship, let 
me tell you, Ben, than even the rations. Young- 
sters think seafaring a fine life because it's full of 
danger, and looks pretty enough from the shore ; 
but only let them come to have six months of it 
'tween decks, cooped up in a berth little bigger 
than a hutch, and as dark and close as a prison 
cell, directly the wind gets a little bit fresh and 
the scuttles and port-holes have to be closed ; and 
to be kept out of their hammocks half the night, 
with the watches that must be kept on deck wet 
or dry, fair or foul — ay ! and to be roused out, 
too, as soon as they get off to sleep — after the 
middle watch, maybe — to reef topsa'ls, or take in 
to'-gallan'-sa'ls, or what not, whenever a squall 
springs up — only let them have a taste of this, I 
say, and they soon begin to sing another song, I 
can tell you. Why, when I was 'prentice on board 
the ' Francis Drake,' I've often been put to walk 
the deck with a capsta'n-bar over my shoulder, 
^and a bucket of water at the end of it, to keep 
me awake, and even then I've been that drowsy 
that I've paraded up and down by the gangway 
as fast asleep as if I'd been a som — som— what 
do you call it ?" 

" -nambulist," suggested Uncle Benjamin. 

" Ay, ay, that's it, mate," nodded the captain, 
with another laugh. " And over and over again, 
when I've sneaked away to pick out a soft plank 
between the hen-coops, and have just dropped off' 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 6T 

the second mate has found me out, and come and 
emptied two or three buckets of salt water over 
me, and set me off strikmg out as if I was swim- 
ming, for I'd be fancying in my sleep, you see, 
that the vessel had got on a reef, and was filling 
and going fast to the bottom. 

" But the worst of all, lad," the sailor went on, 
when he had done puffing away at his pipe, so as 
to rekindle its half-extinguished fire, "is to be 
roused out of your sleep with the bo's'ain's whistle 
ringing in your ears, and the cry of ' A man over- 
board ! a man overboard !' shouted on every side." 

" Ah ! that must be terrible indeed," shudder- 
ed Mrs. Franklin, as she covered her face with 
her palms in horror at the thought. 

Little Ben, however, sat with his mouth open, 
staring up in the captain's face, and mute with 
eagerness to hear the story he had to tell. The 
father and uncle, too, said not a word, for they 
were loth to weaken the impression that the cap- 
tain's simple narrative was evidently making on 
the sea-crazed boy. 

" Ay, ay, mother," Captain Holmes proceeded, 
" it is terrible, I can assure you, to rush on deck 
in the darkness of night, when even your half- 
wakened senses tell you that there is nothing but 
a boundless watery desert round about the ship, 
and to find the canvas beating furiously against 
the masts, as the sails are put suddenly aback to 
check the way upon the vessel. Then, as you fly 
instinctively to the ship's side, you see, perhaps, 
some poor fellow struggling with the black waves, 
and, strange to say, apparently swimming as hard 
as he can aioay from the vessel itself before it is 
well brought to, for one forgets, at the moment, 
you see, the motion of the ship; and so, as it 
dashes past the wretched man in the water, it 
seems as if he, in the madness of his fright, Avas 



68 YOUXG BENJAMIX FRANKLIN. 

hurrying away from the hull rather than the hull 
from him. ' Who is it ? who is it ?' cry a score 
of voices at once. ' Tisdale,' answers one. ' No, 
no, it's Swinton,' says another. ' I tell you it's 
Markham,' shouts a third ; ' he fell from the main 
chains as he was drawing a bucket of water ;' 
and while this goes on, some one, more thought- 
ful than the rest, runs to the st«rn and cuts adrift 
the life buoy that is always kept hanging there 
over the taffrel. Then, as the buoy strikes the 
water, the blue light that is attached to it takes 
fire, and the black mass of waves is lighted up 
for yards round with a pale phosphoric glow. 
But scarcely has this been done before some half 
dozen brave fellows have rushed to the davits, and 
jumping into the cutter over the ship's quarter, 
lowered the boat, with themselves in it, down 
into the sea. The next minute the oars are heard 
in the silence of the night to rattle quickly in the 
rullocks, while the cox'ain cries aloud, ' Give way, 
boys, give way !' and the hazy figure of the re- 
ceding boat is seen to glide like a shadow toward 
the now distant light of the life buoy dancing on 
the water. Then how the sailors crowd about 
the gangway, and cluster on the poop, peering 
into the darkness, which looks doubly dark from 
the very anxiety of the gazers to see farther into 
it. The sight of the sea, Ben, miles away from 
land on a starless night, is always terrible enough, 
for then the dark ring of water encompassing the 
lonely vessel looks like a vast black pool, and the 
sky, with its dull dome of clouds, like a huge 
overhanging vault of lead. But when you know, 
lad, that one of your own shipmates is adrift in 
that black pool — where there is not even so much 
as a rock, remember, to cling to — and battling 
for very life with the great waste of M'aters round 
about him, why, even the roughest sailor's bosom 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. C9 

is touched with a pity that makes the eyes smart 
again with something like a tear. You may fan- 
cy, then, how the seamen watch the white boat, 
as it keeps searching about in the pale light of 
the distant buoy, and hoAv the crowd at the ship's 
side cry first, ' Now they see him yonder ;' and 
next, as the cutter glides away in another direc- 
tion, ' No, they're on the wrong track yet, lads ;' 
and then how the men on board discuss whether 
the poor fellow could swim or not, and how long 
he could keep up in the water; until at length 
the buoy-light fades, and even the figure of the 
cutter itself suddenly vanishes from the view. 
Nothing then remains but to listen in terrible 
suspense for the pulse of the returning oars ; and 
as the throbbing of the strokes is heard along the 
water, every heart beats with eagerness to learn 
the result. ' What cheer, boys, what cheer ?' cries 
the officer, as the boat's crew draw up alongside 
the vessel once more, and every neck is craned 
over the side to see whether the poor fellow lies 
stretched at the bottom of the cutter. And when 
the ugly news is told that the body even has not 
been found (for that is the usual fate in the dark), 
you can form, perhaps, some faint idea, Ben, of 
the gloom that comes over the whole crew. 
'Whose turn is it to be next — Avho is to be left 
like that poor fellow fighting with the ocean in 
the dark? What became of him? is he still 
clinging to the spar that was thrown to him, 
struggling and shrieking to the ship as he sees 
the cabin lights sailing from his sight? or was 
he seized by some shark lurking in the ship's 
wake, and dragged under as soon as he struck 
the waves? Who can say? And the very mys- 
tery gives a greater terror to such an end." 

" The Lord have mercy on the lost one's soul," 
sighed Benjamin's mother, as she hugged her boy 



70 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

close to her knees, grateful even to thanksgiving 
that he had escaped so ghastly a doom. As for 
Ben himself, his eyes were glazed with tears, and 
as he still looked up in the captain's face, the big 
drops kept rolling over his long lashes till his 
little waistcoat was dappled with the stains. 

The good-natured captain did not fail to note 
how deeply the lad had been touched with the 
story, and jerking his head on one side toward 
the boy, so as to draw the father's attention to 
the youngster, he indulged in one of his habitual 
chuckles as he said, " Come, come, Ben, swab the 
decks. You haven't heard half of the perils of 
a sailor's life yet. Ah! you lads think a long 
voyage at sea is as pleasant as a half hour's cruise 
in the summer time ; so I did once ; but a few 
wrecks in the middle of the ocean, where even the 
sight of a gull, or a brood of Mother Carey's 
chickens seems a perfect Godsend in the intense 
solitude of the great desert about you, and where 
the same everlasting ring of the horizon still pur- 
sues you day after day, till the sense of the dis- 
tance you have to travel positively appals the 
mind — a few weeks of such a life as this, lad, is 
sufficient to make the most stubborn heart turn 
back to home and friends, and to pray God in 
the dead of the night, when there is nothing but 
the same glistening cloud of stars set in the same 
eternal forms to keep one company, that he may 
be spared to clasp all those he loves to his bosom 
once again. You think a sailor, youngster, a 
thoughtless dare-devil of a fellow, with hardly a 
tender spot to his nature — the world speaks of 
bis heart as a bit of oak ; but I can tell you, boy, 
if you could hear the yarns that are spun during 
the dog-watches on the fo'cas'l, there is hardly a 
tale told that isn't homeward bound, as we say, 
and made up of the green scenes of life rather 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. Tl 

than the ugly perils at sea. Ay ! and what's more, 
Ben, if we could but know the silent thoughts of 
every heart on deck during the stillness of the 
middle watch, I'd wager there is not one among 
them that isn't away with mother, sister, or sweet- 
heart, prattling all kinds of fond and loving things 
to them. Your father Josiah, too, would tell you 
that sailors are a godless, blaspheming race ; but 
I can tell you, lad, better than he (for I know 
them better), that a seaman, surrounded as he 
always is w^itli the very sublimity of creation — 
with the great world of water by day, which 
seems as infinite and incomprehensible as space 
itself, and w4th the lustrous multitude of stars by 
night — the stars, that to a sailor are like heaven's 
own beacon-lights set up on the vast eternal shore 
of the universe, as if for the sole purpose of guid- 
ing his ship along a path where the faintest track 
of any previous traveler is impossible — the sailor, 
I say, amid such scenes as these, dwells under the 
very temple of the Godhead himself, and shows 
in the unconquerable superstition of his nature — 
despite his idle and unmeaning oaths — how deep- 
ly he feels that every minute of his perilous life 
is vouchsafed him, as it were, through the mercy 
of the All-merciful." 

The pious brothers bent their heads in rever- 
ence at the thoughts, while the mother looked ten- 
derly and touchingly toward her son-in-law, and 
smiled as if to tell him how pleased she w^as to 
find that even he, sailor as he was, had not forgot- 
ten the godly teaching of his Puritan parents. 

For a moment or two there was a marked si- 
lence among the family. The captain had touch- 
ed the most solemn chord of all in their heart, 
and they sat for a while rapt in the sacred reverie 
that filled their mind like the deep-toned vibra- 
tion of " a passing bell." 



72 TOXJNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Presently Captain Holmes, who was unwilling 
to leave his brother Ben without fairly rooting 
out every thread of the romance that bound the 
little fellow to the sea, proceeded once more with 
his narrative. 

" But I'll tell you what. Master Ben, is the most 
shocking sight of all that a sailor has to witness, 
ay, and one that makes a stark coward of the 
bravest, and a thoughtful man of the most thought- 
less — death, youngster ! — death, where there are 
no church-yards to store the body in, and no 
tomb-stones to record even the name of the de- 
parted ; death, amid scenes where there is an ev- 
erlasting craving for home, and yet no home-face 
near to soothe the last mortal throes of the suf- 
ferer. Why, lad, I've seen a stout, stalwart fel- 
low leave the deck in the very flush of life and 
health, as I came on duty at the watch after his, 
and when I've gone below again, some few hours 
afterward, I have found him stricken down by a 
sun-stroke as suddenly as if he had been shot, and 
the sailmaker sitting by his berth, and busy sew- 
ing the corpse up in his hammock, with a cannon 
ball at the feet. The first death I had ever wit- 
nessed, lad, was under such circumstances as 
these. I was a mere youngster, like yourself, at 
the time, and had been by the man's side day aft- 
er day — had listened to his yarns night after 
night — had heard him talk, with a hitch in his 
breath, about the wife and little baby-boy he had 
left behind — had seen her name (ay, and some 
half a dozen others), with hearts and love-knots 
under them, pricked in blue on his great brawny 
arms. I had known him, indeed, as closely as 
men locked within the same walls for months to- 
gether, and suffering the same common danger, 
get to know and like one another. I had missed 
sight of his face for but a few hours, and wh^n I 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 73 

saw it next the eye was fixed and glazed, the 
features as if cut in stone, the hand heavy and 
cold as lead ; and I felt that, boy as I was, I had 
looked for the first time deep down into the great 
unfathomable sea of our common being. The 
hardest thing of all, lad, is to believe in death ; 
and when we have been face to face with a man 
day by day, there seems to be such a huge gap 
left in the world when he is gone, that the mind 
grows utterly skeptical, and can hardly be con- 
vinced that an existence, which has been to it the 
most real and even palpable thing in all the world, 
can have wholly passed away. To look into the 
same eyes, and find them return no glance for 
glance ; to speak, and find the ear deaf, the lips 
sealed, and the voice hushed, is so incomprehen- 
sible a change that the judgment positively reels 
again under the blow. Ashore, lad, you can get 
away from death — you can shut it out with other 
scenes — but on board ship it haunts you like a 
spectre ; and then the day after comes the most 
dreadful scene of all — burial on the high seas^ 

The captain remained silent for a moment or 
two, so that Ben might be able to " chew the cud" 
of his thoughts. Holmes had noticed the little 
fellow's head drop at the mention of the death at 
sea, and he was anxious that the lad should realize 
to himself all the horror of such a catastrophe. 

Presently Captain Holmes began again : " As 
the bell tolls, the poor fellow's shipmates come 
streaming up the hatchways, with their heads 
bare and their necks bent down ; for few can bear 
to look upon the lifeless body of their former com- 
panion, stretched, as it is, on the hatches beside 
the ship's gangway, pointing to its last home — 
the sea ; while the ship's colors, with which it is 
covered, scarcely serve to conceal the outline of 
the mummy-like form stitched in the hammock 



74 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

underneath. It needs no elocution, Ben, to make 
the service for the dead at sea the most solemn 
and imj^ressive of all prayers — an outpouring that 
causes the heart to grieve and the soul to shud- 
der again in the very depth of its emotion ; for, 
with the great ocean itself for a cathedral, and the 
wild winds of heaven to chant the funeral dirge, 
there is an awe created that can not possibly be 
summoned ujd by any human handiwork. And 
when the touching words are uttered of ' ashes to 
ashes, and dust to dust,' and the body is slid from 
under the colors into the very midst of the ocean 
— as if it were being cast back into the great 
womb of Nature itself — a horror falls ujDon the 
senses like a deep absorbing stupor." 

Another long pause ensued. The captain him- 
self was absorbed in recalling all the sad associ- 
ations of the scenes he had described. Josiah 
and Uncle Benjamin had long forgotten the little 
lad whose love of the sea had been the cause of 
the discourse, and were silently nursing the pious 
thoughts that had been called up in their minds, 
while poor Mrs. Franklin sat sobbing and mutter- 
ing to herself disjointed fragments of prayers. 

Presently the mother rose from her seat, and, 
flinging herself on the captain's shoulder, wept 
half hysterically ; at last, with a strong effort, she 
cried through her sobs, " The Lord in heaven re- 
ward you. Holmes, for saving my boy from such 
a fate." 

Next Uncle Benjamin started from his chair, 
and, going toward his little namesake, said, as he 
led him to his weeping parent, " Come, dear lad, 
promise your mother here you will abandon all 
thoughts of the sea from this day forth." 

" I c?o, mother," cried the boy ; " I promise you 
I will." 

The mother's heart was too full to thank her 



A TALK ABOUT THE SEA. 75 

boy by words ; but she seized him, and, throwing 
her arms about his neck, half smothered him with 
kisses, that spoke her gratitude to her son in the 
most touching and unmistakable of all language. 

" Give me your hand, sir," said Josiah to little 
Benjamin; "let us be better friends than we yet 
have been, and to-morrow you shall choose a trade 
for yourself." 

" Oh, thank you, father, thank you," exclaimed 
the delighted lad ; and that night he told his joys 
to his Guinea-pig, and slept as he had never done 
before. 



END OP PART I. 



PAET 11. 



YOUNG ben's lesson IN LIFE, AND WHAT HE 
LEARNED FROM IT. 



CHAPTER YII. 

GOING OUT IN THE WORLD. 



It was arranged by Josiah and his wife, after 
parting with the captain overnight, that young 
Benjamin should be intrusted to the care of his 
uncle for a few days before being called upon to 
select his future occupation in life. 

Uncle Benjamin had pointed out to the father 
that he was too prone to look upon his boy as a 
mere industrial machine, and had begged hard to 
be allowed to take his little godson with him 
" out in the world" for a while, so as to give him 
some slight insight into the economy of human 
life and labor. 

"The lad at present," urged the uncle, "is 
without purpose or object. He knows absolute- 
ly nothing of the ways of the world, and has no 
more sense of the necessity or nobility of work, 
nor, indeed, any clearer notion of the great 
scheme of civilized society, than an Indian pa- 
poose. What can a child like him," the godfa- 
ther said, " understand of the value of prudence, 
of the overwhelming power of mere perseverance, 
or of the magic influence of simple energy and 
will, till he is made to see and comprehend the 
diiferent springs and movements that give force, 



GOING OUT IN THE WORLD. 7T 

play, and direction to the vast machinery of indus- 
try and commerce ? So far as the great world of 
human enterprise is concerned," added the uncle, 
" the lad is but little better than a pup of eight 
days old ; and, until his mind's eye is fairly open- 
ed, it is idle to expect him to have the least in- 
sight into the higher uses and duties of life." 

As soon as the morning meal of the next day 
was finished, little Benjamin, to his utter aston- 
ishment, was presented by his uncle with a new 
fishing-rod and tackle, and told to get himself 
ready to start directly for a day's sport. 

" What ever can this have to do with the choice 
of a trade?" thought the boy to himself 

There was no time, however, for wondering ; 
for the next minute the mother was busy brush- 
ing his little triangular hat, while his sister was 
helping him on with his thick, big-buckled shoes. 
Then a packet of corned beef and bread Avas 
slipped into the pocket of his broad-skirted coat, 
and without a hint as to what it all meant, the 
little fellow was dismissed with a kiss and a 
" God-speed" upon his mysterious journey. 

The boy and his uncle were not long in trav- 
ersing the crooked and narrow streets of Boston. 
The quaint, old-fashioned State House in front of 
the large, park-like " common" was soon left be- 
hind, and the long wooden bridge crossed in the 
direction of the neighboring suburb of Dorchester. 

Young Benjamin, though pleased enough to be 
free for a day's pleasure, was so eager to be put 
to some new occupation, that he kept speculating 
in his own simple manner, as he trotted along 
with his rod on his shoulder, as to why his father 
had broken his promise with him. 

The uncle guessed the reason of his little 
nephew's silence, but said not a word as to the 



7S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

real object of the excursion ; and as they made 
toward the heights of Dorchester, he recounted 
to the lad, in order to divert his thoughts, stories 
of the persecutions of the Franklin family in the 
old country ; till at length, having reached a small 
streamlet at the foot of the heights themselves, the 
rod and line were duly mounted, and the day's 
sport commenced. 

Then, as the boy sat on the green bank, with his 
fishing-rod speared into the ground, and watching 
the tiny float that kept dancing like a straw in the 
current, the old man at his side took advantage 
of the quietude of the spot to impress his little 
nephew with his first views of life. 

It was a lovely autumn day. The blue vault 
of the sky was like a huge dome of air upspring- 
ing from the distant horizon, and flecked with 
large cumulus clouds that lay almost as motion- 
less, from lack of w^ind, as if they were mounds 
of the whitest and softest snow piled one above 
another. From an opening between two such 
clouds the sun's rays came pouring down visibly, 
in distinct broad bands of " fire-mist" — such as 
are seen streaming through a cathedral wmdow 
— and fell upon the earth and water in large 
sheets of dazzling phosphorescence. Out at sea, 
the broad ocean-expanse constituting the Bay of 
Massachusetts looked positively solid as crystal 
in its calmness, while the shadows of the clouds 
above, dulling in parts the bright surface of the 
water, swept over it almost as imperceptibly as 
breath upon a mirror. In the distance, the little 
smacks that seemed to be reveling in the breeze 
far away from land had each left behind them a 
bright trail, which looked like a long shining scar 
upon the water ; and from the scores of islands 
dappling the great ocean-lake, ferry-boats, freight- 
ed with a many-colored load of market-women, 



GOING OUT IN THE WORLD. 79 

peasants, and soldiers, kept plying to and from 
the shore. 

Looking toward the home they had left, the 
town of Boston itself was seen crowding the 
broad peninsular pedestal on which it was set, 
and the three hills that gave it its ancient name 
of " Tri-mountain" swelling high above the tide 
at its base. In front of the city, the masts of the 
many vessels in the harbor were like a mass of 
reeds springing out of the water, and from the 
back and sides of the town there stretched long 
wooden bridges, which in the distance seemed as 
though they were so many cables mooring the 
huge raft of the city to the adjacent continent. 

The country rovmd about was dappled with 
many a white and cosy homestead, and the earth 
itself variegated as a painter's palette with all 
the autumn colors of the green meadows and the 
brown fallow lands — the golden orchards, the 
crimson patches of clover, and the white flocks 
and red cattle with which it was studded ; while 
overhead, on the neighboring Dorchester heights, 
there rose a fine cloud of foliage that was as rich 
and yet sombre in its many tints as the sky at 
sunset after a storm. 

" Look round about you, lad," said Uncle Ben- 
jamin to the youth at his side, " and see what a 
busy scene surrounds us. There is not a field 
within compass of the eye that the husbandmen 
are not at work in. Yonder the plow goes scor- 
ing the earth, as the yoke of oxen passes slowly 
over it, and changing the green soil into a rich 
umber brown, so that the exhausted ground may 
drink in fresh life from the air above. Here the 
farm-cart is in the field, studding it with loads of 
manure at regular distances, to serve as nutriment 
for the future grain. The smoke from the up- 
rooted heaps of stubble burning yonder goes drift- 



80 YOUXG BENJAMIN FEANKLIX. 

ing over the dark plain, in order that even the 
ashes from the past crop may tend to feed the 
coming one. That swarthy-looking fellow you 
see over there, Ben, with a basket on his arm, is 
a sweep sowing soot broadcast for the same pur- 
pose. Down by the shoi'e, again, the people are 
out with their wagons collecting sea-w^eed with a 
like object. At the salt-marshes, too, you per- 
ceive the cowherd is busy opening the sluices, so 
that the tide, as it flows, may moisten the rich 
meadows upon which the cattle are grazing. 

" On the other hand," continued the old man, 
as he pointed to the several objects about him, 
" the tiny vessels yonder, that look like so many 
w^hite gulls as they skim the broad bay, are those 
of the fishermen gathering supplies for to-mor- 
row^'s market. That noble-looking Indiaman, wdth 
the men, like a swarm of bees about its yards, 
gathering in the i^outing sails as it enters the 
harbor, is laden with teas and spices from the 
East ; and that line of craft moored beside the 
' Long wharf,' with the cranes dipping into their 
holds, is landing bags of sugar from the Western 
Indies. The drove of cattle halting there to drink 
at the road-side pool, and with their reflected im- 
ages coloring the water like a painting, have come 
from the distant prairies to swell our butchers' 
stores. ■ The white figure you can just see at the 
top of yon mill is that of the miller'sSnan, guiding 
the dangling sacks of flour on their w^ay down to 
be carted off to the city. The very birds of the 
air — the crows now cawing as they fly over head ; 
the swallows twittering as they skim zigzag across 
the surface of the pools ; the white gull yonder, 
that has just settled down on the waves ; the 
hawk poised above the wood waiting for the 
coming pigeon — are one and all in quest of food. 
Even the very insects beside us are busy upon 



GOING OUT IN THE AVOKLD. 81 

the same errand. The big bee buzzing in the 
flower-cup at our feet; the tiny ants, that are 
hardly bigger than motes in the sunbeam, hurry- 
ing to and fro in the grass ; the spider, that has 
spun his silken net across the twigs of the adja- 
cent hedge, are all quickened with the cravings of 
their bigger fellow-creatures. Indeed, the sports- 
man on the hills above, whose gun now makes the 
woods chatter again, is there only from the same 
motive as is stirring the insects themselves. And 
you yourself, Ben — but look at your float, lad ! 
look at your float ! The bobbing of it tells you 
that the A^ery fish, like the birds and the insects, 
the sportsmen and the husbandmen round about, 
have left their lurking-places on the same hungry 
mission. Strike, boy, strike !" 

As the uncle said the words, the delighted 
youngster seized the rod, and twitched a plump- 
looking chub, struggling, from the pool. 

In a few minutes the prize was stored away in 
the fish-basket they had brought with them, and 
the float once more dancing in the shade above 
the newly-baited hook in the water. 

And when the rod was speared anew in the 
ground beside the brook, Uncle Ben said to his 
nephew, as the little fellow flung himself down on 
the bank slope, " Can you understand oioio^ my 
little man, why I brought you out to fish ?" 

The lad looked up in his uncle's good-humored 
face, and smiled as the solution of the morning's 
riddle flashed across his mind. 

" "Why, to teach me, uncle, that every thing that 
lives seeks after its food," answered the younger 
Benjamin, delighted with the small discovery he 
had made ; for as yet he had never shaped in his 
mind the cravings of creatures into any thing ap- 
proximating to a general law. 

*' Hardly that^ my little man," replied the uncle, 
F 



82 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

"for I should have thought your own unguided 
reason would have shown you as much ere this. 
What I really want to impress upon you, Ben, is 
rather the vital necessity for work. The lesson I 
wish to teach you is not a very deep one, my lad, 
but one that requires to be firmly and everlasting- 
ly engraven on the mind. Now look round again, 
and see what difference you can notice between 
the lives of animals and plants. Observe what is 
going on in the fields, and what among the in- 
sects, the birds, the fishes, the beasts, and even 
the men, that throng the land, the air, and the 
water about us." 

The boy cast his eyes once more over the broad 
expanse of nature before him, and said, hesita- 
tingly, " The animals are all seeking after food, 
and — and — " 

" The husbandmen are busy in the fields, taking 
food to the plants," added Uncle Benjamin, help- 
ing the little fellow to work out the problem. 

" The one form of life goes after its food, and 
the other has it brought to it." 

The old man paused for a minute, so that the 
lad might well digest the difference. 

" The distinctive quality of an animal," he then 
went on, " is that it seeks its own living, Avhereas 
a plant must have its living taken to it." 

"I see," said Benjamin, thoughtfully. 

" An animal," said the uncle, " can not thrust 
its lower extremities into the ground, and drink 
ujD the elements of its trunk and limbs from the 
soil, like the willow-tree there on the opposite 
bank, whose roots you can see, like a knot of Avrith- 
ing snakes, piercing the earth all round about it. 
Unlike the tree and the shrub, Ben, the animal is 
endowed with a susceptibility of feeling, as well 
as fitted with a special and exquisitely beautiful 
apparatus for motion. The sentient creature is 



GOING OUT IN THE WOBLD. 83 

thus not only gifted with a sense of hunger to tell 
him instinctively (far better than any reason could 
possibly do) when his body needs refreshment, 
but, in order to prevent his sitting still and starve 
ing with pleasure (as he assuredly would have, 
done if hunger had been rendered a delight to 
him), this very sense of hunger has, most benev- 
olently, been made painful for him to suffer for any 
length of time. Now it is the pain or uneasiness 
of the growing appetite that serves to sting the 
muscles of his limbs into action at frequent and 
regular intervals, and to make him stir in quest 
of the food that is necessary for the reparation of 
his frame ; and, what is more, the allaying of the 
pain of the protracted appetite itself has been ren- 
dered one of the chief pleasures of animal nature." 

"How strange it seems, uncle, that I never 
thought of this before ; for, now you point it out 
to me, it is all so plain that I fancy I must have 
been blind not to have noticed it," was all that 
the nephew could say, for the new train of thought 
started in his brain was hurrying him away with 
its wild crowd of reflections. 

"Rather it would have been much stranger, 
Ben, could you have discovered it alone ; for such 
matters are visible to the mind only, and not to 
be noted by the mere eyes themselves," the uncle 
made answer. 

" I understand now," exclaimed the boy, half 
musing ; " all animals must stir themselves in or- 
der to get food." 

" Ay, my lad ; but there is another marked dif- 
ference between animals and plants," continued 
the uncle, " and that will explain to us why even 
food itself is necessary for animal subsistence. A 
tree, you know, boy, is inactive — that willow 
would remain where it is till it died unless moved 
by some one — and there is, therefore, little or no 



Si YOUNG BKXJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

waste going on in its frame ; hence the greater 
part of the nutriment it derives from the soil and 
air is devoted to the growth or strengthening of 
its trunk and hmbs. But the chief condition of 
animal life is muscular action, and muscular action 
can not go on without the destruction of the tis- 
sues themselves. After a hard day's exercise, men 
are known to become considerably lighter, or, in 
other words, to have lost several pounds' weight 
of their bodily substance. Physicians, too, assure 
us that the entire body itself becomes changed 
every seven years throughout life : the hair, for 
instance, is forever growing, the nails are being 
continually pared away, the iDreath is always car- 
rying off a certain portion of our bulk, the blood 
is hourly depositing fresh fibre and absorbing de- 
cayed tissues as it travels through the system; 
transpiration, again, is forever going on, and can 
only be maintained by continual drains upon the 
vital fluids within. Even if we sit still, our body 
is at work — the heart beating, the lungs playing, 
the chest heaving, the blood circulating ; and all 
this, as with the motion of any other engine (even 
though it be of iron), must be attended with more 
or less friction or rubbing away of the parts in 
motion, and consequently with a slower or quick- 
er wearing out or waste of the body itself" 

" I should never have thought of that^ uncle," 
observed the youth. 

" It is this waste, lad, which, waking or sleep- 
ing, moving or resting, is forever going on in the 
animal frame, that makes a continual supply of 
food a vital necessity with us all. Food, indeed, 
is to the human machine what coals are to Savery's 
wonderful steam-engine — the fuel that is neces- 
sary to keep the apparatus in motion ; and, as a 
chaldron of coal applied to a steam boiler will do 
only a certain amount of work, so a given quanti- 



GOING OUT IN THE WORLD. 85 

ty of bread and bacon put into a man's stomach 
is equal to merely a definite quantity of labor. 
But, since we can only get food by working, why 
work itself, of course, becomes the supreme neces- 
sity of our lives. Our blood, our heart, our lungs 
are, as I said, forever at work, and we must there- 
fore work, if it be only to keep them working. It 
is impossible for such as us to stand still without 
destroying some portion of our substance, and 
hence one of three things becomes inevitable." 

"And what are they, uncle?" 

" Why, work, beggary, or death !" was the 
overwhelming reply. " You may choose which 
of the three you will adopt, but one or other of 
them there is no escaping from. You must either 
live by your own labor, lad, or by that of others, 
or else you must starve — such is the lot of all." 

" Work, beggary, or death !" echoed the boy, 
as he chewed the cud of his first lesson in life. 
" Worh^ beggary^ or death V 

Then suddenly turning to his uncle, the little 
fellow exclaimed, " You have given me thoughts 
I never knew before. Let me go home and tell 
my father and mother how difi'erent a boy you 
have made me, and my future life shall show you 
how much I owe to this day's lesson." 

The journey home Avas soon performed, for 
young Benjamin was too full of what he had 
heard to feel the distance they journeyed. 

" Well, Ben, my boy," exclaimed the father, as 
the little fellow entered the candle-store, *' what 
sport have you had? What have you brought 
home ?" 

"I have brought one fish," answered his son, 
demurely. 

" Is that all ?" asked the old man. 

" N'o," repUed the altered youth. " I have come 



86 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

back with one fish and one strong determination, 
father." 

" Eh, indeed ! A strong determination to do 
what, my lad ?" said the parent. 

" To lead a new life for the future," was the 
grave response of the little man. 



CHAPTER yill. 

"a hit! a hit!" 



That night, after the evening hymn had been 
chanted by the family, to the accompaniment of 
the father's violin as usual, and young Benjamin 
had retired to rest, the conversation of the broth- 
ers and the wife turned upon the marked change 
that had occurred in the little fellow's behavior. 

" He certainly seems a different lad," observed 
the father, as he arranged the table for the hit at 
backgammon that he and his brother Benjamin 
occasionally indulged in after the day's work; 
"quite a different lad. I really don't think he 
nttered a word beyond ' asking the blessing' all 
supper-time." 

"And when I went up to his room to take his 
light," chimed in the mother, who had now set- 
tled down to her knitting, and was busy refoot- 
ing a pair of the young carpenter's worsted stock- 
ings, " the dear child was praying to God to give 
him grace and strength to carry out his new pur- 
pose." 

" Well ! well ! that looks healthy enough, 
mother," exclaimed Josiah, rattling away at the 
dice-box, " if it'll only last. You see the flesh is 
weak with all of us, and children are but reeds in 
the wind — poor little reeds, mother." 

" Last !" echoed Benjamin, as he raised his eye 



"a hit! a hit!" 81 

for a moment from his brother's game, " why, 
with God's blessing, it's sure to last, that it is. 
What I've told you all along. Josh, is that you 
hadn't faith in that boy's mind. He's as like our 
own brother Tom, I say again, as one grain of 
sand is to another ; and as our Thomas came to 
be the foremost man of our family, why, mark my 
words. Josh, your Ben will grow up to be the 
greatest man in all yours, though I dare say 
none of us here will ever be spared to see the 
day. The boy has a fine common-sense mind of 
his own, and where there's a mind to work upon, 
you can do any thing, brother, within reason. 
With jackasses, of course you must give them 
the stick to make them go the way you want ; 
but with rational creatures, it's only a fool that 
believes blows can do more than logic. What 
first set you and me thinking about our duties in 
life. Josh ?" he asked, and gave the dice-box an 
extra rattle as he paused for a reply. "Wa^it 
kicks, eh ? kicks and cuffs ? No ; but it was sit- 
ting under good old Luke Fuller at the North- 
ampton Conventicle, and listening to his godly 
teachings — that it was, if Z know any thing about 
it. And now I'll tell you what I mean to do with 
my godson Ben. I've made myself responsible 
for the errors of his youth, you know, and what 
I mean to do is this — " 

The mother stopped her needles for the mo- 
ment as she awaited anxiously the conclusion of 
the speech ; but Benjamin, who by this time had 
got by far the best of the hit at backgammon, 
paused to watch the result of the throw he was 
about to make; and when the dice were cast 
upon the board, Josiah, who, like his brother, was 
divided between the discourse and the contest, 
inquired, 

" Well, and what do you mean to do, Master 
Ben ?" 



88 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" Why, I mean to gammon you nicely this time, 
Master Josh," he rephed with a chuckle as he 
" took up" the " blot" his antagonist had le^^t on 
the board. 

" Tut ! tut ! man alive," returned Josiah, in a 
huff at the ill luck which pursued him. "But 
what do you mean to do with the boy, I want to 
know?" 

" Why, I mean," answered brother Benjamin, 
abstractedly, as the game drew to a close, and he 
kept gazing intently at the board, " I mean — " 
and then, as he took off his last man, and started 
up, rubbing his palms together as briskly as if it 
were a sharp frost, with exultation over his vic- 
tory, he added, " But you shall see — you shall see 
what I mean to do with him. Come, that's a hit 
to me, brother." 

It was useless for Josiah or his wife to attempt 
to get even a clew to the method Uncle Benjamin 
intended to adopt with their son. 

The godfather, on second thoughts, had judged 
it better to keep his mode of proceeding to him- 
self ; and so, findiog he could hardly hold out 
against the lengthened siege of the father and 
mother, he deemed it prudent to beat a retreat ; 
and accordingly, seizing his rush-light and the 
volume of manuscript sermons, that he never let 
out of his sight, he wished the couple good-night, 
and retired to his room. 



CHAPTER IX. 

THE WILL AND THE WAT. 

A SMALL sailing vessel lay becalmed next morn- 
ing far out in the offiug of the Massachusetts 
Bay. The fresh breeze that had sprung up at 



THE WILL AND THE WAY. 89 

sunrise had gradually died away as the day ad- 
vanced toward noon, and now the main-sail hung 
down from the yard as loose and straight as a 
curtain from a pole, while the boom kept swing- 
ing heavily from side to side as the boat rolled 
about in the long and lazy swell of the ocean. 
At the helm sat one of the smartest young cock- 
swains out of Boston harbor — Young Benjamin 
Franklin; and near him was the unc4e who had 
undertaken to shape the little fellow's course 
through life. 

The lad was again at a loss to fathom the reason 
of the trip. 

So long as the breeze had lasted he had been 
too deeply engrossed with the management of 
the craft — too pleased with watching the bows 
of the tiny vessel plow their way through the 
foaming water, like a sledge through so much 
snow — to trouble his brains much about the ob- 
ject of an excursion so congenial to his heart. 
So long as the summer waves rushed swiftly as 
a mill-sluice past the gunwale of the boat, and the 
hull lay over almost on its side under the press- 
ure of the pouting sail, the blood went dancing, 
almost as cheerily as the waves, through the veins 
of the excited boy, and his hand grasped the till- 
er with the same pride as a horseman holds the 
rein of a swift and well-trained steed. But when 
the wind flagged, and the sail began to beat back- 
ward and forward Avith each lull in the breeze, 
like the fluttering wing of a wounded gull, the 
little fellow^ could not keep from wondering why 
Uncle Benjamin had brought him out to sea. 
What could any one learn of the ways of the 
world in an open boat far away from land ? 

The boy, however, lacked the courage to in- 
quire what it all meant. 

Presently he turned his head to note the dis- 



90 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

tance they had run, and cried as he looked back 
toward Boston, " Why, I declare, uncle, we can 
hardly see the State House !" 

" Yes, lad," was the answer, " the town has 
faded into a mere blot of haze ; but how finely 
the long curving line of the crescent-shaped bay 
appears to rampart the ocean round, now that the 
entire sweep of the shore is brought within grasp 
of the eye ! What a vast basin it looks ; so vast, 
indeed, that the capes which form the horns of 
the crescent coast seem to be the very ends of the 
earth itself ! And yet, vast as it looks to us, lad, 
this great tract of shore is but a mere span's length 
in comparison with the enormous American con- 
tinent ; that continent which is a third part of the 
entire earth — one of the three gigantic tongues 
of land that stretch down from the north pole,* 
and ridge the ocean as if they were so many 
mighty sea-walls raised to break the fury of the 
immense flood of water enveloping the globe. 
Now tell me, who was it that discovered the 
great continent before us, Benjamin?" 

" Cristofaro Colombo, the Genoese sailor, on the 
11th of October, in the year 1492," quickly an- 
swered the nephew, proud of the oj^portunity of 
displaying his knowledge of the history of his na- 
tive land. 

" And that is but little more than two hundred 
years ago," the other added. " For thousands of 
years one third of the entire earth was not even 
known to exist by the civilized portion of the 

* The three tongues of land spoken of are, 1 . North and 
South America ; 2. Europe and Africa ; 3. Asia and Aus- 
tralasia. Each of these great tracts is more or less divided 
midway into two portions. Between the two Americas flow 
the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea ; between Eu- 
rope and Africa, on the other hand, runs the Mediterranean ; 
while Asia and Australasia are separated by the Chinese 
Sea and Indian Archipelago. 



THE WILL AND THE WAY. 91 

globe ; and had it not been for the will of that 
Genoese sailor, you and I, Ben, most likely, would 
not have been gazing at this same land at this 
same moment." 

" The vnll of Columbus !" echoed the nephew, 
in wonderment at the speech. 

" Yes, boy. I have brought you out in this boat 
to-day to show you what the mere will of a man 
can compass," continued the uncle ; " for I want 
to impress upon you, my little fellow, now that 
we are here, with the mighty American shore 
stretching miles away before our eyes, how the 
will of a simple mariner gave these mighty shores 
an existence to the rest of the habitable globe." 

" The will !" repeated the boy. 

" Yes, Benjamin, the will !" the uncle iterated 
emphatically ; " for the finding of this great coun- 
try was not a mere accidental discovery — not a 
blind stumbling over a heap of earth in the dark 
— but the mature fruition of a purpose long con- 
ceived and sustained in the mind. When did 
Columbus first form the design of reaching India 
by a westward course ?" asked the old man, de- 
lighted to catechise his little godson concerning 
the chronicles of America. 

Young Ben reflected for a moment, and then 
stammered out, as if half in doubt about the date, 
"As early as the — as the year 1474,1 think the 
book says, uncle." 

" Yes, boy, he formed the design nearly twenty 
years before he made the discovery. To reach 
India by sea," proceeded the mentor, " was the 
great problem of navigation in those days. Mar- 
co Polo had traveled overland as far even as China 
and Japan ; but the boats of our forefathers, flat- 
bottomed as they were, and impelled only by oars, 
were unable to venture far out of sight of land ; 
for in those days sailors hadn't even the knowl- 



92 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

edge of the compass, nor of any instrument to 
measure the altitudes of the stars, whereby to 
guide a vessel in its course. Even the passage to 
India round by the Cape of Good Hope was a 
voyage that none as yet had had the hardihood 
to undertake. Well, and what were the reasons 
Columbus had for believing that land lay across 
the Atlantic ?" 

"The objects cast on the shores of Europe aft- 
er westerly winds," spoke out the boy, for the in- 
teresting story of the discovery of America had 
been scanned over and over again by him. "Be- 
sides, you know, uncle, after Columbus married 
Phihppa de Palestrello, he supported himself, and 
kept his old father too, at Genoa by drawing 
maps and charts." 

" There's a brave lad !" returned the uncle, pat- 
ting his godson encouragingly on the head, till 
each kindly touch from the old man thrilled 
through every nerve of the youngster; "and in 
the old charts by Andrea Bianco and others of 
Venice, Columbus had doubtlessly been struck by 
the long range of territory that was vaguely in- 
dicated as lying to the Avest of the Canary Isl- 
ands. Well, when the sailor had once formed the 
idea of crossing the Atlantic in quest of land, what 
did he do ? Did he sit down and grieve that he 
was too poor to fit out the fleet that was necessa- 
ry to put the project into execution, eh, lad ?" 

" No, uncle," was the ready reply ; " he jour- 
neyed with his little son Diego, who was then, if 
I remember rightly, only eleven years old (for his 
wife Philippa, you know, uncle, had died some 
time before), to the difierent courts of Europe, in 
the hope of getting some of the kings to give him 
ships and men for the voyage." 

" Ay ; and when he found himself foiled by the 
intrigues of the courtiers of John the Second of 



THE WILL AND THE WAY. 98 

Portugal, and the great scheme of crossing the 
Atlantic rejected by the council of the state, did 
the sailor give way to desj^air, and abandon the 
project forever in disgust?" again the old man 
interrogated the youth. 

"No, Uncle Benjamin; he set out with his lit- 
tle son to Spain, though in the greatest poverty 
at the time, and there sought the assistance of 
Ferdinand and Isabella." 

"And how long did he remain there, lad, danc- 
ing attendance on the lackeys of a government, 
many of whom even laughed to scorn the notion 
of the world being round ?" was- the next query. 

" Five years he staid in Spain," the youth re- 
plied. 

"And Avhen all hope failed him there, what did 
he afterward ? Did he lose heart, and pluck his 
long-cherished purpose out of his mind ?" 

" No, no !" exclaimed the lad, whom the uncle 
had now worked up to a sense of the sailor's in- 
domitable determination; "Columbus then got 
his brother Bartholomew to make proposals for 
the voyage to Henry YII. of England." 

" Yes," exclaimed the elder Benjamin, " and to 
England this man of stern will would most as- 
suredly have gone had not the Queen Isabella, 
Avhen she heard of it, been persuaded to send for 
him back." 

"And then, you know, she consented to pledge 
her jewels so as to raise money enough for the 
expedition," chimed in little Benjamin. 

" So she did, my little man," the godfather re- 
turned with an approving nod ; " and by such 
means, at last, three small vessels, the ' Santa 
Maria,' the ' Pinta,' and the ' Nina' (two of them, 
remember, being without decks), were fitted for 
sea, and one hundred and twenty hands to man 
them collected, by hook or by crook, with the 



94 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

greatest difficulty, owing to the general dread of 
the passage. And when the tiny fleet of fishing- 
smacks (for it was little better, boy) ultimately 
set sail — on the 3d of August, 1492, it was — out 
of the port of Palos, in the Mediterranean, and 
made straight away for the broad havenless ocean 
itself, did the will of the bold adventurer — the 
will that he had nursed through many a long year 
of trial, Avant, and scorn — did it weaver one jot 
then, or still point to the opposite shore, steady 
as the compass itself to the pole ? ay, and that 
even though he knew that the crew he command- 
ed were timid as deer, and the boats he had to 
navigate almost as unseaworthy as cradles ?" 

" I never read the story in this w^ay before, 
uncle," exclaimed the thoughtful boy, now that 
the object of his teacher began to dawn upon his 
mind. 

" I dare say not, lad ; but hear the grand tale 
to its end," was the answer. " Well, for some 
months, you know, Ben, the wretched little fleet 
of open boats had been beating about the wide 
and apparently boundless Atlantic, and the sail- 
ors, worn with fatigue and long want of shelter 
and proper food, had grown mutinous and savage 
at searching for what seemed to them like the 
very end of space itself; and then the great ad- 
miral (for you remember he had been made one), 
though still fortified by the same indomitable pur- 
pose as ever, was obliged, after exhausting every 
other resource, to beg of his rebellious sailors a 
few days' grace, and to promise to return with 
them then, if unsuccessful. Night and day after- 
ward did this man of iron resolution gaze into the 
clouds that rested on the horizon, and believe he 
saw in them the very land that his fancy had dis- 
covered there nearly twenty years before ; but at 
last this same cloud-land had so often cheated the 



THE WILL AND THE WAif. C5 

sight, that all hope of seeing any shore in that 
quarter had been banished from every breast — 
but his own. One night, however — the memora- 
ble night of the 15th of October, 1492 — as the 
admiral sat on the poop of the ' Santa Maria' peer- 
ing into the darkness itself, he thought he beheld 
moving lights in the distance ; then the crew 
were called up to watch them, and eye after eye 
began to see the same bright fiery specks wan- 
dering about in the haze as the admiral himself; 
until, at length, doubt grew into conviction, and 
a wild exulting cry of 'Land! land!' arose from 
every voice. 

" And when the morning dawned, and the eyes 
of Columbus gazed upon that strange coast, crim- 
soned over and gilt with the rays of the rising- 
sun, who shall describe the passions that crowded 
in his bosom ? who shall tell the honest pride he 
felt at the power of the will which had led him 
to summon, into existence as it were, the very 
land before him? or how even he himself mar- 
veled over that stanch fortitude of purpose which 
had sustained him through years of trial to such 
an end ?" 

" It icas^ then," said the boy, half stricken down 
with wonder at the thought, now that he could 
grasp it in all its grandeur, " the will of Columbus 
that gave America to us." 

" It was, lad, the will of the heroic Genoese 
sailor, expressing the will of God ; and if it was 
the will of a simple mariner that first made known 
this enormous continent — this new world, as we 
call it — why, it was merely the same inflexible 
resolution that first peopled it with the very race 
that now possesses it." 

" Indeed !" cried the boy, in greater amazement 
than ever. 

" Yes, Ben," was the answer. " The same iron 



96 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

determination was in the souls of the Pilgrim Fa- 
thers as in that of Columbus himself; but theirs 
was one of a holier nature. They sought these 
lands neither quickened by a life of adventure 
nor stirred by the lust of riches. They had mere- 
ly one immovable purpose in their heart — to wor- 
ship the Almighty after the dictates of their own 
conscience — and it was this that led the pious 
band to quit the shores of the Humber in the old 
country; this that sustained them for years as 
exiles in Holland ; and this which ultimately bore 
them across the Atlantic in the ' Speedwell' and 
the ' Mayflower,' and gave them strength to fight 
through the terrors of the first winter here in 
their adopted father-land." 

"How strange!" exclaimed the musing lad; 
" will discovered the land, and loill peopled it." 

"Yes, Benjamin; it was to make you compre- 
hend the power of this same loill in man that I 
brought you out here to-day. I wanted to let 
you see almost with a bird's eye the mighty ter- 
ritory that has been created by it. The plains, 
which a few years back were mere wild and half- 
barren hunting-grounds possessed by savages, are 
now studded with large and noble towns — the 
fields striped with roads and belted with canals 
— the coast pierced with harbors — the land rich 
with vegetation — the cities busy with factories — 
the havens bristling with shipping — ay, and all 
called into existence by the indomitable will of 
the one man who originally discovered the coun- 
try, and that of the conscientious band who after- 
ward came from England to make a home of it. 
It was the will of the Almighty that first summon- 
ed the land out of the water, lad ; and it is the 
same God-like quality in man — the great creative 
and heroic faculty — that changes barren plains 
into fertile fields, and builds up cities in the wil- 
derness." 



HOW TO MAKE WORK PLEASANT. 9T 



CHAPTER X. 

HOW TO MAKE WORK PLEASANT AND PROFITABLE. 

It was now time for the uncle and nephew to 
thhik about returning to Boston harbor. They 
had promised to be home to a late dinner at two ; 
but the promise had been made irresj^ective of 
the wind and the tide, and the couple were then 
some miles out at sea, without a breath of wind 
strong enough to waft a soap-bubble through the 
air, and with a strong ebb current drifting them 
farther from land. 

The head of the vessel was at length, by dint of 
sculling, brought round to the shore, but still the 
sail hung down as limp and straight as the feath- 
ers of barn-door fowls after a heavy shower, and 
even the paper that the uncle threw overboard 
(as he ojDened the packet of bread and meat they 
had brought with them) floated perpetually by 
the ship's side, as motionless as the pennant at 
the mast-head. 

" Heyday, my man, we seem to be in a pretty 
fix here," cried Uncle Benjamin, as he munched 
the bread and beef, while he kept his eyes rivet- 
ed on the piece of the old '■'-JBostoii Gazette^'' swim- 
ming beside them in the water. " What do you 
say, my little captain — what's to be done ? Re- 
member, I'm in your hands, youngster." 

" There's nothing to be done tbat I see, imcle," 
returned the youth, as he smiled with delight at 
the idea of being promoted to the captaincy of 
the vessel — "nothing but to wait out here pa- 
tiently till sundown, and then a breeze will spring 
G 



98 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

up, most likely ; it generally does, you know, at 
that time. Bat I tbouglit it 'ud be so, to tell you 
the truth, while you were talking ; and I should 
have -whistled for a wind long ago, but I fancied 
you might think I wasn't attending. It's impos- 
sible to pull back with this heavy tide against us ; 
and if you look out to sea, uncle, there isn't a puff" 
of wind to be seen coming up along the water 
any where;" and as he said the words the little 
monkey put his hand up before his brows, in im- 
itation of his old sailor friends, and looked under 
them in all directions, to observe vdiether he 
could distinguish in the distance that ruffling of 
the glassy surface of the water which marks the 
approach of a breeze in a calm. 

" Well, captain, what must be mi^s^," said the 
godfather, calmly resigning himself with all the 
gusto of a philosopher at once to the position and 
the victuals. "There's no use railing against 
the wind, you know, and it's much better having 
to whistle for a breeze than a dinner, I can tell 
you. So come, lad, while you fall foul of the 
meat and the cider, I can be treating you to a 
little snack of worldly philosophy by way of salt 
to the food ; and so, you see, you can be digest- 
ing your dinner and your duty in life both at the 
same time." 

The youngster proceeded to carry out his un- 
cle's order in good earnest, for the sea-trip had 
Avhetted his bodily ajDpetite as much as the story 
of Columbus had sharpened the edge of his wits ; 
so, pulling out his clasp-knife, he fell to devouring 
the buffalo hump and the old man's discourse al- 
most with equal heartiness. 

"Well, my son," proceeded the elder Benja- 
min, " I have shown you the power of the will in 
great thhigs, and now I Avant to point out to you 
the use of it in what the world calls ' little things.' 



HOW TO MAKE WOEK PLEASANT. 99 

I have made you understand, I think, that the 
pnme necessity of life is labor. But labor is nat- 
urally irksome to us. You remember, boy, it was 
the primeval curse inflicted upon man." 

" So it was !" exclaimed the lad, in haste to let 
his uncle see that he knew well to what he re- 
ferred. " ' In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat 
bread,' were the words, uncle." 

" Good, good, my son. I'll make a fine, up- 
right man of you before I have done, that I will," 
added the delighted godfather. "But labor, 
though naturally irksome and painful, still ad- 
mits, like hunger itself, of being made a source 
of pleasure to us." 

" How can that be ?" the nephew inquired. 

" Well, Ben," the uncle went on, " there are 
three means — and only three, so far as I know — 
by which work may be rendered more or less de- 
lightful to all men. The first of these means is 
variety ; the second, habit ; and the third, ^^wr- 
pose^ or object.'''^ 

"I don't understand you, uncle," was all the 
boy said. 

"You know, my little man," the other went 
on, "that as it is hard and difficult to remain at 
the same occupation for any length of time, so 
does it become a matter of mere recreation to 
shift from one employment to another as soon as 
we grow tired of what we have been previously 
doing. Child's play is merely labor made easy, 
and what boys call amusement is often very hard 
work. But it is the change of occupation that 
makes even the severest muscular exercise a mat- 
ter of sport to youth. A whole life of foot-ball, 
however, or fifty years at leap-frog, would be far 
more fatiguing, I can tell you, than the hewing 
of wood or the drawing of water. And even this 
boating, which is so delightful to you, lad, when 



100 YOUXG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

pursued as a relaxation or relief from other modes 
of work, is the heaviest possible punishment to 
the poor galley-slaves who are doomed to it for 
the term of their natural lives. The great zest 
of life is change, boy, even as the chief drug of 
our existence is the mental and bodily fatigue 
which arises from long continuance at the same 
l^ursuit. Recreation, indeed, is merely that res- 
toration of energy which comes from change of 
work or occupation; and it is this principle of 
change or variety in labor which, as with the 
boating of boys, can transform even the hard work 
of galley-slaves into a matter of child's play." 

" Oh, then, uncle," cried little Benjamin, flush- 
ed with the belief that he had made a grand dis- 
covery, " why not let people work at a number 
of diflerent things, and do each for only a little 
time, instead of setting them to labor always at 
the same pursuit for the whole of their lives? 
Every one would h^fond of working then." 

"Yes ; but, lad," rejoined the old man, smiling 
as well at the simplicity as at the aptness of his 
pupil, " this flighty or erratic kind of labor would 
be of no more value to the world than are the 
sports of children. A tailor must continue using 
the needle for years, Ben, before he can work a 
button-hole fit to be seen. How long miist peo- 
ple have toiled on and on, generation after gen- 
eration, before they learned how to make window- 
glass and bottles out of the sand and the weeds 
by the sea-shore! Could you or I, Ben, ever 
hope, by laboring half an hour a day, to get a 
pair of scissors or a razor out of a lump of iron- 
stone, or to fashion a slice of an elephant's tusk 
into the exquisitely nice symmetry of a billiard 
ball? For labor to be of special use and value 
to the world, it must have some special skill ; and 
skilled labor, being but the cunning of the fingers, 



now TO MAKE A^'OI^K PLEASANT. 101 

requires the same long education of the hands 
as deep learning does of the head. It is because 
savages and vagabonds have no settled occupa- 
tions that their lives are comparatively worthless 
to the rest of mankind." 

"I see now!" ejaculated the thoughtful boy. 

"Yes, my lad, variety of occupation makes 
work as pleasant as play," the uncle added, " but 
it makes it as valueless also. So now let us turn 
to the second means of making labor agreeable." 

" And that's habit, I think you said," interject- 
ed the younger Benjamin. 

" I did," he replied. " Now habit, I should 
first tell you, my little man, is one of the most 
wonderful principles in the whole human consti- 
tution. The special function of habit is to make 
that which is at first irksome for us to do, pleas- 
ant after a time to perform : it serves to render 
the actions which originally required an express 
effort on our j^art to execute, so purely mechan- 
ical, as it were (when they have been frequently 
and regularly repeated for a certain period), as 
to need almost the same express effort then to 
preve7it us indulging in them." 

" How strange !" mused the nephew. 

" The simple habit of whittling will teach you, 
lad, how difficult it is for people to keep their 
hands from doing work they have been long ac- 
customed to. Again, when you were trying to 
j)lay your father's violin, you remember how hard 
you found it to move each finger as you wanted, 
and how your eye was obliged to be fixed first 
on the music-book and then on the strings, in or- 
der to touch each particular note set down, until 
at length, disgusted with the tedium of the task, 
you left off practicing on the instrument alto- 
gether ? And yet, had you pursued the study, 
there is no doubt you would ultimately have 



102 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

played with all the ease, and even pleasure, of 
your father, and have got to work your fingers 
ere long with the same nimbleness, and even the 
same inattention, as your mother plies her knit- 
ting-needles while reading in the evening." 

" So I should, I dare say ; but isn't it odd, un- 
cle, that mere habit should do this ?" observed 
the lad, as he grew alive to the wonders worked 
by it. 

" It is odd, my boy — very odd, indeed, that the 
mere repetition of acts ^X frequent and regular 
intervals (for that is all that is required) should 
make them, however difficult and distasteful at 
first, grow easy and congenial to us in time ; that 
it should change pain into pleasure, labor into 
pastime; that it should render a certain set of 
muscles unconscious of effort, and callous to fa- 
tigue, and transform the most arduous voluntary 
actions into the simplicity and insensibility of 
mere clock-work. But so it is, my little man; 
and it is this same principle of habit applied to 
the different forms of manual labor which consti- 
tutes what is termed ' industrial training ;' it is 
this which makes ' skill' in the world, and gives 
to the handiwork of mechanics a stamp of the 
cunning and dignity of art." 

" The use of apprenticeship, then, I suppose," 
observed the boy, " is to form a kind of habit of 
working in a particular way — isn't it so, uncle ?" 

" Well said, my quick little man. There is a 
high pleasure in teaching such as take delight in • 
learning, like you, Ben." 

" But, uncle," continued the youth, tingling all 
over with dehght at the applause, " if habit can 
do away with the unpleasantness of labor, where 
can be the use of the other thing you spoke of as 
a means of making work agreeable — though I 
forget what you said it was, I'm sure." 



now TO MAKE WORK PLEASANT. 103 

" It was purpose or object^ my lad, that I told 
you makes work pleasant also." 

"Oh yes, so it was — purpose or object," youDg 
Benjamm repeated; "but I hardly know what 
you mean by such grand words." 

" They are not only grand words, but they 
stand for the grandest things in life, my little fel- 
low," the old man went on. " Habit, after all, 
makes a man work but as a machine. The black- 
smith who has been long accustomed to wield 
the sledge-hammer has no more sense of fatigue 
(except when he Avorks beyond the time he has 
been used to) than that wonderful new invention 
the steam-engine, which you have seen swinging 
its iron arms about as it pumps the water out of 
our docks. But a man with a purpose, my son, 
works like a man, and not like a steam-engine, 
even though that very purpose makes him as in- 
sensible of weariness in his labor as the steam-en- 
gine itself." 

" Does purpose, then, as you call it, do the same 
as habit, uncle ?" inquired the youth. 

" Yes, Ben, but it does that immediately which 
habit requires years to accomplish. Only let a 
man put his whole soul into what he is doing — 
let him work, so to speak, lad, with his heart in 
his hand, and the toil is instantly made a high and 
grand delight to him. This is the wonderful ef- 
fect of the will, Ben. What you will to do, you 
must, of course, do willingly, and therefore more 
or less easily ; and labor is especially repulsive 
when your will wants to be off working at one 
thing while your hands are constrained to be toil- 
ing at another. Those who are without purpose 
in life, boy, are vagabonds either in body or spirit, 
for if there be no settled object there can hardly 
be any settled pursuit. Such people, therefore, 
fly from this to that occupation, according as the 



104 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

caprice of the moment may happen to sway them : 
they are like empty bottles, lad, cast into the great 
ocean, far away from land, destined to be buflet- 
ed about by the winds and the waves of every 
passing storm, and driven whithersoever the cur- 
rent of the time may chance to carry them. With- 
out some enduring purpose, boy, there can be no 
enduring work ; and, after all, it is continuity in 
labor, or long persistence at the same pursuit, that 
masters every difficulty, and beats down every ob- 
stacle. The power of the sturdy sand-bag, you 
know, Ben, is far greater than that of the impetu- 
ous cannon ball." 

" How wonderful !" was all the little fellow 
could say, as he mused over what he heard. 

The uncle went on : " But I want to show you 
now, lad, hoic it is that the will can produce in an 
instant the same wondrous changes as habit does 
in years, and I want to do this so as to impress 
the matter deeply and indelibly on your mind. I 
have pointed out to you what great things icill 
can accomplish in the world, and I now wish to 
let you see how easily and 2^^^<^iscmtly it can ac- 
complish them." 

" I should like to hear that, uncle," said the at- 
tentive boy, " for as yet I can hardly understand 
what you mean." 

" Of course you can not comprehend in a min- 
ute, Ben," the old man replied, " principles that 
have cost philosophers years of study to arrive 
at. But I will try and make the operation of will 
in man more plain to you. Now I pointed out to 
you yesterday that animals difler from plants — in 
what respect, lad ?" 

" Why, in going after their food instead of hav- 
ing it brought to them, uncle," was the ready re- 
ply. 

" Yes, my child ; but animals go after their food 



HOW TO MAKE WOEK PLEASANT. 105 

because, as I said, the power of moving has been 
given to them, while plants have no such faculty. 
Nothing, however, can move without a cause. 
This boat stops, you see, directly the propelling 
force ceases ; and the movements of animals, and 
even men, inexplicable as they may seem to you, 
can proceed only from the operation of imiform 
motive powers. You, of course, have never ask- 
ed yourself what it is that moves men to act as 
they do." 

" I'm sure I never gave that a thought as yet, 
uncle," the boy replied frankly. "But, now I 
come to turn it over in my mind, it seems to me 
as if nobody could tell as much." 

" Indeed, lad ; let us see. Well, Ben, innumer- 
able as are the movements continually going on 
in the human frame, they all admit of being re- 
solved into three kinds, according as they are pre- 
ceded or not by some particular feeling. In the 
first place, our muscles may move like the ma- 
chinery of a mere automaton, or, in other words, 
without any feeling at all. Our heart beats and 
our lungs expand continually, without our being 
even conscious of the incessant action going on 
within us — ay, and, what is more wonderful, with- 
out the least sense of fatigue being connected 
with the work." 

" Isn't it strange," Benjamin exclaimed, " that 
our heart never gets tired of moving, like our 
limbs ?" 

" Yes ; and isn't it as kind as it is strange, my 
lad, that such should be the case ?" the uncle re- 
minded his pupil; "but our muscles not only 
move automatically.) without any preceding feel- 
ing, but they move also instinctively — that is to 
say, in consequence of some feeling which imme- 
diately precedes and gives rise to the motion. 
Any sudden pain, such as a burn upon the finger, 



1C3 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEAKKLIN. 

for instance, causes you involuntarily to contract 
the muscles of the injured part, and to withdraw 
the limb directly from the object wounding you. 
Again, if you are surprised or startled by any un- 
expected circumstance, your whole body is drawn 
back, and your hands thrown up immediately, to 
ward oft' the fancied danger — ay, and that, too, 
long before you have time to think about what it 
is best to do, or even to obtain any knowledge as 
to the nature of that which has alarmed you. 
Such muscular movements, however, are wholly 
involuntary — that is to say, they are not left to 
the slow operations of our will to conceive and 
carry out ; but, being necessary for our preserva- 
tion, in common with that of animals, they have 
been made matters of instinct with us as with 
them ; or, in other words, ordained to folloAV im- 
mediately upon a particular feeling existing in the 
mind." 

" Is animal instinct, then," inquired the lad, as 
he pondered over and repeated his uncle's words, 
" merely a certain kind of muscular movement 
made to follow immediately upon a particular 
feeling ?" 

" That is all, my son," was the reply. " The 
bird builds its nest, not with any thought of the 
young she is destined to rear, but merely in con- 
sequence of a vague sensation that is on her at 
the time. The squirrel lays up a store of nuts for 
the winter, not because it foresees a decrease of 
the summer stock, but simply in obedience to the 
feelings and promptings of its nature." 

" I see now," mused the youth, as he turned 
the new truths over and over in his mind. 

" But the muscles of man, my child, have been 
made to move, not only instinctively, or, what 
amounts to the same thing, involuntarily^ accord- 
ing to the dictates of mere animal nature, but 



HOW TO MAKE WORK PLEASANT. 107 

they have been made to move also voluntarily — 
that is to say, in obedience to the suggestions and 
determination of the will. Bishop Cranmer — 
you know who he was, Benjamin ?" 

" Oh yes," cried the youth, "I know ; he was 
one of the martyrs burnt with Ridley and Lati- 
mer opposite Baliol College at Oxford, in Old 
England, and he held his hand in the flames at 
the stake, uncle, because, as he said, 'it had of- 
fended him in writing contrary to his heart ;' and 
he had solemnly declared at St. Mary's Church 
that ' if he came to the fire that hand should be 
punished first.' " 

" Well said, my good little fellow," cheered the 
godfather; "but didn't Cranmer feel the same 
pain from the flames, think you, and the same 
animal instinct to withdraw his hand from them 
as we ourselves should have felt ? and yet it was 
by the determined effort of his will that he kept 
it there, in defiance of the promptings of his an- 
imal instincts, as he cried aloud, 'This unworthy 
hand ! this unworthy hand !' and forced it to burn 
and char before the rest of his limbs. Can you see 
now^ Benjamin, what is the use of will in man ?" 

" I think I can, uncle ; but do you tell me, and 
let me hear whether I am right," he answered, 
for the boy was afraid to trust himself to frame 
his thoughts into speech. 

" Well, lad," Uncle Benjamin replied, " the 
high and noble use of man's will is to control or 
guide the animal instincts of his nature." 

" I thought it was so from what you said about 
Cranmer, uncle ;" and the lad fell musing over the 
subject in his own simple way, while the godfa- 
ther paused to watch with delight the workings 
of the boy's mind, that, like a newly-fledged bird, 
was making its first attempts to fly. " So the use 
of man's will," the youth repeated over and over 



108 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

again to himself, in order to impress the words 
well on his memory, " is to control or guide the 
animal instincts of his nature." 

" But I say, ray noble captain," cried the imcle, 
again waking up to a sense of their position, " are 
we really to remain here all day? I could talk 
to you quite as well if we were moving on a bit, 
but this is sad slow work, my boy." 

" There's a strong ebb-tide on just now, uncle, 
and there's no making the least headway against 
that; and, let me see — let me see," he mused, 
" it would have been high water in the harbor to- 
day at eleven, so it will be about five o'clock be- 
fore the tide turns, you know," and the youngster* 
shook his head, as much as to say he could dis- 
cover no means of getting out of their difficulty. 

" Five o'clock ! tut, tut ! and I Avanted to have 
been at meeting at six." Then, as Uncle Benja- 
min gave vent to his impatience, he tugged from 
his fob a watch as big as the "bull's-eye" to a 
ship's scuttle, and cried, after looking well at the 
dial, and holding it up to his ear to satisfy him- 
self it was still going, " Why, it's not three yet, 
I declare." 

" Besides, you remember, uncle, the sun doesn't 
set now till long past five, and there's no chance 
of a breeze till then, I'm certain," was the only 
consolation the little captain could offer. 

" But are you quite sure of one at that time, 
you young rascal, eh?" inquired the old gentle- 
man, in no little alarm at the idea of having to 
pass the night out at sea. 

" There generally is a breeze at sundown, you 
know, uncle," answered young Ben, delighted to 
display his nautical knowledge once more. 

" Well, all I can say is, I'm in your hands, cap- 
tain — in your hands, bear in mind ; for, Heaven 



BECALMED. 109 

knows, I'm as ignorant as a sucking-pig of all 
that concerns the water ;" and, so saying, the 
elder Benjamin abandoned himself with becom- 
ing resignation at once to the sourness of the cir- 
cumstances and the cider. 



CHAPTER XI. 



BECALMED. 



For a while Uncle Benjamin silently grieved 
over the untowardness which prevented him add- 
ing the discourse of that evening to the three 
volumes of manuscript sermons that he had writ- 
ten out from notes taken in chapel during their 
delivery by the most celebrated preachers of the 
day. His temper, however, was of too even and 
cheerful a quality to be any more ruffled than the 
water itself by the lack of wind ; so, when he had 
drained the cider-bottle, he wrote in pencil on a 
slip of paper, '''All loell oti board 'The Lively 
Nancy,' off Boston^ October 2d, 1719 ;" and cork- 
ing up the playful memorandum, flung the flagon 
with the note inside into the sea. 

" There it goes, Ben," he cried, as he watched 
the bottle dance up and down beside the boat, 
"without any more purpose to direct it than an 
idler. Where it will ultimately land, or what will 
be its end, no one can say." 

The lesson was not wasted on the youth; so, 
stretching himself at full length on the seat op- 
posite his uncle, he said, as he lay comfortably 
arranged for listening, with his cheek resting on 
his hand, " You were telling me, uncle, about the 
use of the will, you know." 

" Well, lad, the function of our will," the old 
man resumed, "is to interfere between our feel- 



110 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

ings and our actions — to check in iis some sudden 
pro^Density that has been j^rompted (either by the 
sense of a present pain or the prospect of a future 
pleasure) before it has time to stir the muscles. 
The will thus serves, you see, Ben, to stay the 
O23eration of our instincts until the conscience has 
sat in judgment on the motives or consequences 
of the contemplated acts — until, indeed, it has 
pronounced them to be either 'right or wrong,' 
' prudent or imj^rudent,' for us to pursue. Nor 
is this all ; for Avheu the moral sense has duly de- 
liberated and determined, the will tends either to 
restrain the impulse, if it be thought bad, or else 
to encourage it, by giving additional force and 
persistence to it, if considered to be good." 

" I can hardly follow you," exclaimed the youth, 
trying to make it all out. 

" You remember the trouble you got into, Ben, 
about reading ' Robinson Crusoe ?' " said his tu- 
tor, proceeding to give him an illustration ; "well, 
the impulse that stirred you then to see what the 
shipwrecked mariner did in his desert island was 
but the natural result of a boy's instinctive de- 
light in adventure ; but though to you, lad, the 
propensity seemed irresistible, had you brought 
your will to bear upon the matter, had you used 
its power to check the oj^eration of the passion 
that was on you (till such time as you had asked 
your own heart whether you ought^ or even 
whether it would be better for you to read at 
such a moment, in defiance of your father's com- 
mands), I am quite sure now what you would 
have determined, or, in other words, what you 
would have icilled to do." 

The little fellow hung down his Head in shame 
to find the error of his past conduct used as an 
illustration of the operation of a mere instinct, un- 
guided and unrestrained by any superior princi- 



BECALMED. Ill 

pie. " I hope I shall act differently for the future, 
uncle," was all he could stammer out. 

"Let it pass, lad, let it pass," cried the old 
man ; and accordingly he went on. " Now it is 
principally in this wonderful faculty of will, Ben, 
that man differs from the rest of the animal crea- 
tion. The most sagacious dog never pauses to 
reflect between its instincts and its acts, neither 
does it weigh the consequences of doing or not 
doing this or that thing, nor determine to act one 
way or the other, according as the action seems 
likely to be beneficial or hurtful to itself or others." 

" Of conrse it doesn't," interposed young Ben. 

"Again, it is will, my boy," the micle continued, 
"that makes the chief distinction between the 
same human being waking or dreaming — in in- 
fancy or manhood — in a state of sanity or insani- 
ty. No one reproaches himself for his thoughts 
and feelings — base and savage as they often are — 
during either sleep or madness, because at such 
times we have no more power than in infancy to 
deliberate on our impulses before giving way to 
them; indeed, we have then neither the sense to 
judge whether they are right or wrong, nor the 
moral strength to encourage or restrain them. 
That our will really sleeps during slumber, you 
yourself, Ben, must be convinced, from the fact 
that in your nightmare dreams you are unable to 
move a limb, or even utter a cry for your protec- 
tion, and that simply because you have then lost 
all power over the nerves and the muscles which, 
in your waking moments, never fail to answer di- 
rectly to the will that is then aroused in you. It 
is this will, moreover, that makes us responsible 
for our actions here ; for as we, unlike the other 
animals, have been endowed with the power to re- 
flect upon the tendency of our impulses — to see 
and weigh the consequences of our acts, and ei- 



112 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

ther to foster the good or reject the bad, why, it 
is but fair that our conduct in this respect should 
be judged both in this world and the next, my 
little man." 

" Oh, now I understand," exclaimed the youth, 
"what has always aj^peared to me so hard to 
make out — why dogs and horses should not go 
to heaven as well as ourselves ! They have only 
instinct to guide them — isn't it so, uncle ?" 

" Yes, my boy," nodded the preceptor, " while 
ice have conscience and will to direct and sustain 
us. But we mustn't wander from our object, 
which was — " and the old man paused to see if 
the lad, in the maze of thought through which he 
had led him, could find his way back to the point 
whence they started. 

" Let me see," pondered httle Ben, " you w^ere 
going to show me, uncle — but I'm sure I forget 
what now." 

" Why, I was going to show you, lad, how will 
or purpose makes work pleasant. Well, then, my 
boy, I must tell you — what would appear at first 
sight to be opposed to such a result — that, Avith 
the operation of the will, there is generally con- 
nected a certain sense of effort, and every efibrt 
we make is more or less trying or irksome to us 
to sustain. If you determine to lift a heavy 
weight, lad, you know how painful it is for you 
to exert your strength to its utmost, and how in- 
tensely fatiguing it is for you to continue doing 
so. Again, you remember how, with the violin, the 
irksomeness of having to move each finger by an 
express efibrt of your will at each difierent note 
soon made you grow weary of the task. With 
the operations of instinct, however, there seems to 
be little or no fatigue associated. The albatross, 
that is met with hovering in mid-ocean, far away 
from any land or even a rock, seems never to be 



BECALMED. 113 

tired of being on the wing; gnats, too, appear to 
fly all the day long ; and though their wings beat 
many times in a second — as we know by the mu- 
sical note they give out — the muscles that move 
them are apparently as insensible of fatigue as 
those that stir our own heart." 

"How, then, uncle, can the exercise of our will 
be made pleasant to us, since, as you say, there is 
always this sense of effort and fatigue connected 
with it ?" inquired the boy, puzzled with the ap- 
parent contradiction. 

"Why, lad," returned the elder Benjamin, 
" such a result may be brought about simply by 
using the will to strengthen the good and virtu- 
ous impulses of our nature, rather than to control 
the bad and vicious ones ; that is to say, by mak- 
ing the will work loith us instead oi against us. 
To do a thing that we have no natural inclination 
to do — to do it merely because our conscience tells 
us that it is right — is to perform an act of stern 
duty, and duty always demands more or less of 
sacrifice on our part. At such times there is a 
continual battle between the animal and moral 
parts of our nature ; the flesh struggles to go one 
way, the spirit another ; force has to be used 
against force, and hence a strong and continuous 
effort is required to sustain us. But our impulses 
are not all bad, Ben. If our instincts would lead 
us to hate and persecute our enemies, surely they 
teach us also to love and benefit our family and 
our friends ; if our appetites, lad, tend to make 
beasts of us, at least our sympathy with the suf- 
fering serves to give us something of the dignity 
of angels. The will, therefore, may be used as 
much to encourage and sustain our higher and 
kindlier propensities, as to restrain and subdue 
our more brutal and savage ones. A man's heart 
may prompt him to good works as well as evil ; 
H 



114 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

and to will to do the good, in preference to the 
evil which our heart desires, is at once to work 
with all the heart and wdth all the soul as well." 

"I think I begin to see w^hat you mean now, 
uncle," young Benjamin murmured half to him- 
self. 

" There is no finer instance of the untiring en- 
ergy of the will, my boy, when working in unison 
with the heart," the old man continued ; " no more 
striking example of its wondrous power at such 
times to render even the heaviest labor light and 
pleasant to us, as well as to support us through 
trials, by giving us a capacity of endurance that 
seems to be almost insensible to suffering and fa- 
tigue, than is to be found in the career of Peter, 
the present Emperor of Russia." 

Young Benjamin had heard his father and the 
chapel deacons, who often " dropped in" to con- 
verse with Josiah in the evening, refer occasion- 
ally, in the course of their political discussions, to 
the Russian monarch as the royal wonder of their 
time ; but as yet the boy had been unable to 
gather more than that this same Peter was a king 
wdio had w^orked as a common shipw^right some- 
where. 

The mere mention of the great man's name, 
therefore, was sufficient to rouse the youngster 
from the seat on which he had been reclining at 
full length while listening to the " drier parts" of 
his uncle's discourse ; so he sat up on the bench, 
with his elbows resting on his knees, and his chin 
pillowed on his palms, while he gazed intently hi 
his uncle's face, eagerly w^aiting for the story he 
had to tell. 

" At ten years of age, lad," the old man began, 
" Peter came to the crown of Russia ; but the 
Queen-regent Sophia, w^ho was his half-sister, 
strove to keep him as ignorant as she could, as 



BECALMED. 115 

well as to make him idle and sensual, by placing 
the most debasing temptations in his way, and 
withholding from him all means of instruction and 
refinement. The queen-regent did this not only 
to keep her brother from the throne as long as 
possible, but to render him utterly unfit for the 
exercise of royal power. The rude, ignorant, and 
self-willed boy, however, was barely seventeen be- 
fore he burst through the regent's control, and 
took the reins qf government into his own hands. 
Then he set to work to educate himself, and mas- 
tered — entirely without tuition, Ben — a knowl- 
edge of several foreign languages. He studied 
also many of the mechanical arts ; for, boy-king 
as he was, and unprejudiced by the luxurious 
training of a court, he had too grand an idea of 
the dignity of labor, and too high a sense of the 
value, even to a monarch, of industrial knowledge, 
to consider such occupations either degrading or 
unfitted to him." 

" Wasn't it noble of him, uncle !" cried the en- 
thusiastic little fellow ; " and how strange that a 
boy like him, without any schooling, should have 
such ideas !" 

" Peter had what is even better than education, 
Ben — better, because it makes us educate our- 
selves, and gives us a firm reliance on our own 
powers," Uncle Benjamin made answer. 

"And what is that, uncle ?" inquired the simple 
lad. 

" Why, can't you guess, can't you guess, my 
clever little man ? — a strong, persistent will," w^as 
the reply. " The mechanic-king had not only an 
instinct that made him conceive great things with- 
out previous training, but a wdll that gave him 
zeal enough to undertake them, endurance enough 
to labor long at them, and determined courage 
enough, come what might, to master them." 



116 YOUNG BENJAMIN FBANKLIN. 

" I see ! I see ! I see !" exclaimed the delighted 
boy, as he still gazed straight in his uncle's eyes ; 
"1 see that will is the greatest power in man." 

" Russia, when Peter came to the throne," con- 
tinued the uncle, " possessed no sea-port but that 
of Archangel, on the banks of the White Sea ; 
and to give ships and commerce to his country 
soon became the one absorbing object of the boy- 
king's mind. Before his time the liussian people 
were merely a race of despised and barbarous 
Muscovites ; but hardly was the crown on his 
head, than the bold young czar had determined 
to create harbors, fleets, trades, manufactures, 
arts, and schools for the nation. Now what would 
you, Ben, have done under the same circumstances, 
with such a purpose in your brain ? Imagine 
yourself a king, boy, Avith almost infinite means at 
your command, w'itli a palace for your home, and 
countless trooj^s and serfs to do your bidding. 
How would you have set about such an under- 
taking?" 

The youth could not help smiling at the idea 
of his coming even to an imaginary throne; and, 
delighted to fancy himself possessed of such im- 
mense power in the world, he cried, exultingly, 
" Why, I should have set the people to work upon 
it, uncle, immediately." 

" Of course you would, like the rest of the 
world, lad," was the rejoinder. " But Peter was 
no ordinary man ; so, before setting the people to 
build ships for him, he resolved to learn how to 
build them for himself. And how do you think 
he learned the art, Ben — by having masters to 
teach him, eh ?" 

The boy, ashamed of his previous mistake, re- 
mained silent this time. 

" Not he !" the uncle added. " A man of his 
will wanted no masters, lad. Kin^j thouci^h he 



BIX'ALMED. 117 

was, there was but one way of making liiinself 
thorouglily and practically acquainted with the 
craft, and that was by learning it as other men 
learn it — by working at it with one's own hands ; 
and the idea once formed, his was not the rahid 
to be shaken from its object." 

''Did he then really labor as a common ship- 
wright, eh, uncle?" timidly inquired the youth. 

"Assuredly he did, lad — labor, and live like a 
common laborer too. His heart longed to make 
liis country a great commercial nation, and his 
will gave him strength and courage to accom- 
plish his purpose, as no monarch had ever done 
before. With his darling object deep in his 
heart. King Peter traveled as a private person to 
the two great maritime countries of the time, 
first to Ilolland, then to England, and worked 
in the dock-yards of Amsterdam and Deptford 
as an ordinary ship-builder, living and faring like 
his fellow-mechanics — his crown laid on one side 
for a paper cap, a flannel jacket and apron dis- 
placing Iiis royal robes." 

Little Benjamin could only cry, "How won- 
derful! how grand!" as the story went on. 

"And was the labor of such a life drudgery 
to such a man, think you, Ben ? No, lad ! rest 
assured, no! Of all the workmen in those dock- 
yards, depend upon it, none toiled so zealously, 
none with so light a heart, so vigorous a hand, or 
with so little sense of fatigue, as he who wielded 
a hammer instead of a sceptre. And why, Ben- 
jamin, was it so ?" 

" Because he was working with his xohole hearty 
as you said, uncle, and with his whole soul too," 
the boy exclaimed, now fired with sufficient en- 
thusiasm almost to have started on the same mis- 
sion himself. 

"Just so, my good little man," nodded his 



118 YOrXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

imcle, approvingly. "He was not laboring like 
a mere animal, bestirring himself only in quest 
of food, bnt a high and noble purpose was fast 
in his mind, a strong and energetic will quick- 
ening his muscles, and giving courage and vigor 
to his heart. It was the will withm him, lad, 
that made the laborer-king do his work with 
scarcely an effort — this that kej^t him to the task 
day after day, and month after month, without 
any flagging, and with hardly a desire for rest — 
this that made his humble mechanic's home hap- 
pier than a palace, and his simple mechanic's fare 
daintier than any royal banquet. So now, Ben, 
remember, that of all the Avays to make labor 
pleasant, and even A\aluable, there is nothing like 
having a noble purpose backed by a noble will." 
"I shall never forget it, uncle — never," the 
youth replied, solemnly, as the lesson sank deep 
into his mind ; " at least so long as I recollect the 
stories of Columbus and the Pilgrim Fathers, as 
well as that of Peter the Great." 

The lesson ended, Uncle Benjamin began to 
wake up, as it were, to a sense that he and his 
nephew were still miles away at sea, and without 
any apparent prosj^ect, too, of being favored with 
the promised breeze at sundown. 

" Come, I say, captain," the uncle cried, as he 
glanced toward the shore, and beheld the sun 
trembling like a huge golden bubble, as it seemed 
to rest poised on the very edge of the distant 
hills, and tinting the air, earth, and sea with a 
blush that was as faint and delicate as the rosy 
lining of a shell; "come, I say, master, where's 
your breeze at sundown ? Pm afraid you're out 
in your reckoning, my little skipper." Where- 
upon the couple looked again toward the horizon 
in the vain hope of discovering the slightest trace 



BECALMED. 119 

of what sailors call a " cat's-paw" on the water. 
Keither was there a smgle " goat's-hair" nor 
" mare's-tail'^ to be seen, like whifFs of gossamer, 
floating in the sky ; for the clouds were still gath- 
ered into those large cumulus snow-clumps which 
are indicative of a summer stillness in the air, 
while the sea itself was so calm and smooth that 
it looked like a broad pavement of glass, more 
easy to be walked over than sailed through. 

The young skipper felt himself called upon to 
give his little breeches the true nautical hitch as 
he informed his alarmed godfather that he " real- 
ly didn't see what was to be done under the cir- 
cumstances, except, indeed, to whistle, for that 
was the remedy which the best sailors always 
prescribed for a lack of wind." 

"Whistle!" shouted Uncle Benjamin, as he 
laughed outright at the absurd though desperate 
predicament in which they were placed ; " and is 
that the result of all my long moral lessons to you 
this day, you young monkey?" and as he said 
the words he seized the lad and shook him play- 
fully by the ear. "Have I been out with you 
here ever since the morning, trying to hammer 
into your little noddle that wdll overcomes all 
difficulties, and yet you have faith now — only in 
tohistUng. Why, Ve may stop here the night 
through, and puff every gasp of breath out of our 
bodies before we shall get wind enough that way, 
you superstitious young rascal you (and again he 
twiddled at the boy's ear), to drive even a wal- 
nut-shell through the water." 

" Well, but, uncle, it's impossible to i^uU all the 
way back to Boston," remonstrated the nephew ; 
and, as if to assure himself of the fact, he cast a 
despairing glance toward the coast, that now, as 
the twilight fell like a thick haze over the water, 
appeared even dimmer and more distant than 
before. 



120 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" And you assert that as your deliberate o^^in- 
ion, eh, captain ?" smiled the old man', as he 
bowed with mock deference to the j^oungster. 

"It certainly seems to me impossible," little 
Benjamin made answer, with a shrug of his shoul- 
ders expressive of utter helj^lessness under the 
circumstances. 

" I can only say, then, that I'm vastly glad to 
hear it, Master Ben," answered the uncle, chafing 
his palms together with pretended delight, "be- 
cause the very predicament we're in will afford 
you the finest possible opportunity of proving, in 
a practical manner, the power of the icill in you ; 
and you'll learn from it, moreover, my lad, how 
it's much better to depend on that than on any 
power of whistling in such a position." 

" But, uncle, it's eight miles to Boston Harbor 
if it's an oar's length," remonstrated the faint- 
hearted youngster. 

" Xever mind, boy. If it were tw^enty, but loill 
to master the distance, and you'll find it only a 
hop, skip, and a jump after all. Come, lad !" 
cried the old man, slapping the little fellow on 
the back to rouse his dormant energy. "Have 
faith in your own j^owers — have faith, Ben, for 
without faith there are no good w^orks, I can tell 
you. It's easier, any how, to* scull a boat than 
to build ships. Pete.r liad the welfare only of his 
country to stir him to do what he did, but you 
have father and mother to make happy by your 
brave deeds. Set your heart on home, boy, and 
your hands will bring you there fast and readily 
enough. Have you no purpose to lighten the la- 
bor? Is there no distant glory to rouse in you 
will enough to sustain you at the work ? Will 
it be no delight to your parents to find that you 
can be a fine, noble fellow if you please ? that you 
have a man's purpo^ now in your heart, and a 



BECALMED. 121 

man's will in your sonl? that you have no longer 
such a childish dread of continuous toil as to be 
cowed by a few ugly-looking difficulties. Let 
them see that you are ready to fight the battle 
of life Avith a courage that can never waver ; a 
resolution strong enough to change defeat into 
triumph ; an energy sufficiently enduring to make 
you compass what you set your heart upon? 
Think of this, my little man, think of this, and 
work to gladden father and mother, as King Pe- 
ter worked to benefit a nation." 

" I'll do it ! I'll do it, 'uncle ! You shall see to- 
night what a man you have made of me. Ay, 
and father and mother shall see it too." And, 
without another w^ord, the little fellow proceeded 
to lower the sail, and then stripping off his coat, 
he seized the sculls, and began to give w^ay in 
right good earnest. 

By this time the lights of Boston city in the 
distance had come twinkling forth one after an- 
other, as if they had been so many stars peeping 
over the horizon ; and as the boy labored at the 
oars, the uncle cheered him on by reminding him 
of the moving lights that Columbus had seen on 
the shore in the night, as he sat on the poop of 
the " Santa Maria," and he bade him have the 
same will to reach those shores as had sustained 
Columbus himself. 

Next he would tell the lad how John Huss, the 
martyr, had willed to die for the truth, and how 
the brave Bohemian had chanted hymns at the 
stake w^hile the flames were curling about his 
body. Then he w^ould recount to him the story 
of Palissy the potter, explaining to liim that Pa- 
lissy was the discoverer of the means of glazing 
earthenware — our cups, plates and dishes before 
his time having been as rude and rough as tiles — 



123 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANIiLIN. 

and that so determined had he been to succeed 
in his object, that he not only broke up the very 
bedsteads of his wife and children for fuel for his 
furnaces, but burnt the flooring and rafters of the 
house they lived in ; until, at length, the potter 
mastered all the difficulties that beset him, and 
realized an immense fortune by the discovery. 

When, too. Uncle Benjamin fancied he could 
see the little fellow's spirit or strength beginning 
to flag^ he would cry aloud to him, " Pull, lad ! 
pull as King Peter would have pulled under the 
same circumstances ;" or else the old uncle would 
make the little fellow laugh by telling him that 
he himself would try to help him, but he knew he 
should "catch a crab" the very first stroke, and 
be hurled backward over the seat into the bottom 
of the boat. 

Then, these resources being exhausted, the old 
man tried to beguile the way to the boy first by 
chanting hymns, afterward by reciting portions 
of " Paradise Lost," and next by telling him sto- 
ries about John Milton, the great Non-conformist. 

It w^as, however, hard work enough for the lit- 
tle fellow to hold on ; and, had not the tide been 
floAving, he must have given in or dropped before 
half of the distance had been traveled. 

Nevertheless, the boy labored on and on, reso- 
lute in accomplishing the task. Indeed, his pride 
increased rather than flagged as he drew nearer 
to the harbor lights, so that when his uncle urged 
him to rest on his oars for a while, he scorned to 
listen to the suggestion, and fell to with redoubled 
vigor. 

Still, the last half mile was ail-but more than 
little Benjamin could manage. His hands were 
smarting with blisters, and the muscles of his arms 
and back aching with their long exertion. Many 
a time he thought he must drop the sculls. Nev- 




A strong will can master difticulties which seem insupei'ahle to a weak heart. 



A NEW WORLD. 125 

ertheless, he could not bear to be beaten after all 
he had done ; so on he went again, looking round 
almost at every other stroke to note how much 
farther he had to go. 

Then the old man, seeing the struggle of the 
poor boy, fell to cheering him, first clapping his 
hands and crying " Bravo ! bravo, captain !" and 
then calling him " Peter the^ Little" and " young 
blaster Cristofaro," till the little fellow was 
obliged to laugh even in his pain. And after that 
he told him to think of the grand story he should 
have to tell his father and mother, on reaching 
home, about his young friend Captain Benjamin 
Franklin, as to how he had saved his old uncle by 
his great courage and energy, as well as fine sea- 
manship, from being drifted out of sight of land at 
nightfall without either provisions or water. 

Thus, at last, the harbor was gained. 

And when the little hero stepped from the boat 
on to the landing-place, he felt, though his arms 
were cramped with the long labor, that he was 
really a new man ; that he had learned for the 
first time in his life to have faith in his own en- 
ergies, and had found out by experience that a 
strong vnll can master difficulties which seem in- 
superable to a vaeah heart. 



CHAPTER XII. 

A NEW WORLD. 

" Hoi, Ben, hoi ! we'll stop here, lad ! stop, you 
wild young jackanapes — stop, I say !" shouted the 
uncle through his hands to his young fellow-trav- 
eler, who had started on ahead, as they burst from 
out the dusk of a dense wood into the brii^ht sun- 
shine of a vast open plain. 



o 



126 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

The long, luxuriant grass of the broad meadows 
before them reached so high above the belly of 
the shock-coated pony young Benjamin was rid- 
ing, that the little porpoise-like animal positively 
seemed to be swimming along in a sea of verdure. 
However, in obedience to the summons, the boy 
leaned back on the saddle, like a rower in his seat, 
as he tugged at the creature's mouth, and cried 
aloud, " What, stop fiere, uncle — stop here /" 

Then wheeling round, he galloped back to the 
old man, and found him already hanging over the 
saddle in the act of dismounting. The imcle 
paused for a moment with one foot in the stirrup ; 
and as he looked across the pommel at the fea- 
tures of the disappointed lad, he could hardly 
keep from laughing on beholding his godson's 
face all lengthened out with wonder almost as 
extravagantly as if it had been reflected in the 
bowl of a teaspoon. 

" Stop here P'' iterated the amazed young Ben- 
jamin. " Why, there isn't a house for miles 
round; just you look yourself, uncle ; you can't 
see a curl of smoke any where about — can you, 
now ?" And the youth leaned his hand upon the 
crupper, while he turned himself sideways on his 
saddle to look well back upon the scene. 

" I know, boy, there is not a homestead nearer 
than a day's ride," answered the godfather, still 
inwardly enjoying the fun of the boy's bewilder- 
ment, and patting on the shoulder, now that he 
was fairly dismounted, the old " nag-horse" that 
had borne him from St. Louis that morning. 
" Xevertheless, this is our journey's end, Master 
Benjamin." 

'^ Tills our journey's end! Well, well!" the 
youth exclaimed, in greater amazement than ever, 
as he tossed up his head like a horse with a half- 
empty nose-bag ; and then drawing one foot from 



A NEW WORLD. 127 

the Stirrup, he screwed himself round once more 
on the saddle as upon a pivot, so as to take an- 
other good broad survey of the country. " Why, 
I thought you were going to show me some large 
town or other, uncle — or some great shipping 
place — or grand farm, perhaps; but what your 
object can be in bringing me out here to an im- 
mense wilderness in the back-woods, I'm sure I 
can't tell ;" and the half-sulky lad flung himself 
oif his pony, and stood almost up to his middle in 
the grass. 

Then, by way of consolation, he proceeded to 
hug the shaggy little steed round the neck, call- 
ing him the while his " darling Jacky," and " a 
beauty," and telling the tiny creature, as he cud- 
dled and caressed it like a human being, "how 
happy he would be if Jacky only belonged to 
him, instead of the French farmer they had bor- 
rowed it from." 

" Patience, my little philosopher, patience. You 
shall know all in good time," was the simple re- 
buke of the godfather while slipping the bridle 
from his nag previous to turning him adrift in 
the herbage, that was almost as high as corn. 

Little i3enjamin proceeded to follow the old 
man's example, and, having divested Jacky of 
his head-gear, he advanced toward his uncle with 
the bit dangling from his hand. Then, as the lad 
stood on tiptoe beside a neighboring tree, trying 
to hang the bridle on the same branch as his god- 
father had used for the same purpose, he exclaim- 
ed, "But, uncle, you 7nust allow I've had a good 
bit of patience already. Why, let me see, we've 
been away from home now" (and he paused to 
make a mental calculation of the precise time) — 
" yes ! more than three weeks, I declare ; and 
though I did worry you, perhaps, a good deal at 
first — when we were in the sloop, you know, on 



128 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

our way from Boston to Annapolis — as to where 
you were going to take me, and why we were 
coming so far away from home, still, you remem- 
ber, when I found you wouldn't tell me any thing 
about it, but bade me have a little jDatience, as you 
do now, why, I never said another w^ord to you 
on the matter, though I must confess I couldn't 
keep from twisting it over and over in my mind 
all the time we were in that strange-looking old 
stage-wagon traveling over the Alleghany Mount- 
ains to Pittsburg, and that was many days — 
wasn't it uncle, eh ?" 

" Yes, you monkey ! but you made up for it 
well — that you did — on board the 'ark' that we 
came down the Ohio in," responded the tutor, as 
he shook his forefinger playfully in the face of 
the laughing lad ; " for then not a town appeared 
in sight but it was, 'Are we going to stop here, 
uncle ?' ' Is this the place you wanted me to see, 
uncle ?' ' How long will it be before we get to 
our journey's end, uncle ?' " What are you going 
to show me this time, uncle ?' and a thousand and 
one other knagging questions that would have 
given poor old Job himself an attack of the bile." 

" Well, I dare say I did tease you a bit, poor 
unky," replied the wheedling little fellow, as he 
sat down on the grass beside his godfather, and 
curled his arm about his neck, while, half abash- 
ed, he leaned his head upon the old one's shoul- 
der ; " but you should remember I'm only ' a bit 
of a boy' still, as mother says. Besides, you have 
such a strange way of teaching me things, you 
know — so different from old Mr. Brownwell ; 
though I am sure he was kind enough to all of 
us boys in the school. First, you take me out 
fishing; then we go boating together ; and though 
I fancied each time you meant merely to treat me 
to a day's pleasure, I found out afterward that 



A NEW WORLD. 120 

you had planned the trip only on purpose to give 
me some lesson in life." 

" Yes, my dear lad," said the kind-hearted old 
gentleman, while passing his hand over the cheek 
of his young pupil, "I turned your recreations 
into matters of study. I used your boyish sports 
as a means to show you what is a man's business 
in the world. Children remember their nursery 
rhymes better than their catechism, Ben, because 
the lesson is pleasanter ; and when the heart is in 
the work, the task, you know now, lad — " 

" Is always lightened," promptly replied the lit- 
tle fellow. " I recollect, uncle, it was that which 
made the hard labor of the dock-yard come so 
easy to Peter the Great. But still, unky, dear, I 
really can't see what there is to be learned in 
such a place as this." (The old man shook his 
head as he smiled at the boy's frankness.) " You 
said you were going to teach me how to get on 
in life, but what can I possibly learn of the ways 
of the world in a part that seems to be almost out 
of it — where there are no towns, no farms, no 
crops, no workshops, no shipping — nothing, in- 
deed, but the tracks of wild Indians, wild birds, 
and wild cattle ?" 

"I dare say, my little man, it does seem strange 
to you," replied the uncle, " and doubtlessly it 
will seem much stranger when I tell you that I 
have brought you all this long way from home — 
many hundreds of miles — to this vast uninhabited 
plain to teach you — " 

" What ?" cried the eager boy, unable to Avait 
for the conclusion of the sentence. 

" IIow to be rich, my son," was all the reply. 

"How to be rich!" cried the youth, even more 
bewildered than ever. "How to be rich! Oh, 
I sliould like to know about that^ uncle, very 
much ;" and, boy-like, he chuckled with delight at 



130 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

the prospect of getting plenty of money. " But, 
dear me ! this is an odd kind of place to come to 
for such a lesson. Why, there are no riches at all 
here that I can see — nothing but a great barren 
plain for miles and miles on." 

" Barren do you call it, you rogue !" echoed the 
tutor, still amusing himself with the perj^lexity of 
his pupil. 

" Well, uncle, there is no corn growing, nor 
any turnip-fields, nor kitchen-gardens, nor any or- 
chards either that I can see," explained young Ben. 

" True, lad," replied the other, as he proceeded 
to spread out on the grass before him the packet 
of venison-hams and bread that he had brought 
from St. Louis for their gipsy dinner that day; 
" but, uncultured as it is, the finest English park, 
laid out with the nicest taste, and kept with the 
greatest care, is not more beautiful ; no farm, how- 
ever well tilled, has soil so rich as that beneath 
our feet ; no mea-dows in the world are flocked 
with finer herds of cattle, or carpeted with a rich- 
er sward; no plantation is set with nobler trees 
or greener shrubs ; no squire's preserves in the 
old country are more abundant in game ; no flor- 
ist's garden is studded with such a choice profu- 
sion of flowers as you behold here, spangling the 
earth as thick as stars in the Milky Way ; nor is 
any orchard better stocked with fruit, for yonder 
you see it dangles, as in Aladdin's wonderful gar- 
den, like balls of gold and big jewels from the 
boughs. 

" This is an American prairie, lad !" the old 
man went on — " one of God's own parks — crea- 
tion's broad manor, of which every man in a prim- 
itive state is 'lord' — the noble estate which Na- 
ture entails on her barbarian children. Yonder 
are the beeves and the venison with which she 
welcomes her helpless offspring on their entry 



A NEW WORLD. 131 

into the world ; here the fruits with which she 
strews their board before they have learned to 
grow them for themselves; this the soft velvet 
carpet that she spreads for lier barefooted sons, 
and these the flowers which she hangs, like bright 
beads and bells, about the cradles of her first- 
born." 

Young Benjamin had never seen a prairie be- 
fore. He had often read of the immense Ameri- 
can plains, and often heard of them, too, from the 
neighbors and deacons who came to chat at his 
father's house in the evening; he had heard of 
them also from his companions at school, while 
telling one another stories of the wild Indians 
and the wonders of the new country; and from 
his brother-in-law, " the trader in furs and skins," 
as well as from the sailors and mates whose ac- 
quaintance he had picked up at the Boston harbor. 

Boy-like, he had often longed to learn whether 
the reality in any way resembled the imaginary 
picture that repeated descriptions had conjured 
up in his mind. Up to this time he had seen the 
great plains only, as it were, in a dream — like the 
image of a magic lantern gloaming faintly in the 
dark; and now that the vast tracts themselves 
were spread before his eyes in all the vividness 
of sunshine, he was so intent upon learning his 
uncle's object in bringing him thus far from home, 
that, until the witching word " prairie" fell from 
the old man's lips, the little fellow had no sense 
that he was gazing upon the grand Indian hunt- 
ing-grounds for the first time in his life. 

But now the lad began to look upon them with 
different eyes, and grew eager to detect the many 
natural charms of which he had heard and read. 

As he glanced fitfully from spot to spot, he 
noted the several clumps of trees rising like wood- 
land islets out of the boundless ocean of verdure 



132 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

which surrounded them ; the long, luxuriant grass 
undulating in the breeze with waves that rolled 
across the plain as if it were one vast liquid law^n, 
and that kept playing in the light with all the 
rich, soft shades of moving velvet ; and the gen- 
tly swelling land heaving here and there in long, 
sweeping curves, like the sea in the lazy languor 
of a calm after a summer storm. 

As far as the eye could reach, the earth was 
one immense floor of meadows, vast as a desert, 
and yet rich as a garden, and planted like a ])ark. 
The broad land was like an endless lake of fields 
rather than the earth, as we ordinarily know it 
broken into small patches, and hemmed in by hills 
and hedges. The prairies were a-flame with the 
myriads of bright-colored wild flowers that scin- 
tillated, as so many sparks of fire, in the waving 
grass, amid which the yellow helianthus bloomed 
so luxuriantly that it threw a bright amber tint 
over the entire plains, and made them seem, at a 
little distance ofi", as gorgeous as a natural field 
of cloth of gold. 

The prairie flowers, indeed, were of every scent 
and hue ; there were the rich prairie violets pur- 
pling the soil in positive masses of color, and per- 
fuming the air with luxurious daintiness ; the wild 
bean-flowers fluttering in the breeze like floral 
butterflies, and scattering, as they swung to and 
fro, a delicate odor of vanilla nil around ; the balls 
of white clover, shaped like fairy Guelder roses, 
filling the atmosphere witli a honeyed fragrance; 
the slender rushes of the wild lavender, like little 
blue ears of corn, nodding redolently amid the 
blades ; the daisy-like chamomile flowers, twink- 
ling as though they were a galaxy of silver stars 
in the grass. In sooth, the rich soil was so preg- 
nant with sweetness here that, at every tread of 
the foot, the fragrance of the crushed flowers — 



A NEW WORLD. 133 

of all the infinite variety of little scented herbs — 
steamed up in rich gusts, and mingled with the 
other odors, till the exquisite interblending of the 
several shades and grades of redolence made the 
air seem to be filled with a very rainbow of per- 
fumes. 

Nor was the feast of color less gorgeous. The 
waxen-stemmed balsams were of every hue, and 
looked like hundreds of little elfin Maypoles gar- 
landed with many-colored roses ; the foxglove, 
with its long stalk hung with bright purj^le bells ; 
the glowing crimson cups of the monster cactus- 
blossoms, dazzling as heaps of burning coal ; the 
vivid amber tufts of the clustering honeysuckle — 
all made the earth sparkle with the brilliant tints 
of the kaleidoscope, and look as rich, w^ith its 
hundred hues, as the marigold window of some 
ancient cathedral. 

Then the prairie trees had a grandeur and a 
beauty unknown to other parts. Now they grew 
in circular clumps, and seemed like a broad tower 
of foliage springing from the soil. Here flourish- 
ed the gaudy tulip-tree, with its huge flowers, 
glowing among the leaves bright as the tinted 
lamps upon a mimic Luther's-tree ; there was seen 
the stately cotton-tree, graceful as a Corinthian 
column, with the trumpet-flower twining up its 
stem, and the big scarlet blossoms swinging, like 
bells of red coral, in the air. The Judas-tree was 
there too, with its gorgeous hues ; and the carne- 
lian cherry-tree, with its yellow parachute-shaped 
flowers, and the red balls of frnit dangling beneath 
them ; and the beaver-wood as well, with its long, 
glossy, laurel-like leaves and its blush-white wax- 
en petals ; and the papaw-tree, with its tall naked 
stem, spreading like a palm at the top, and its 
orange-colored custard apples, like balls of gold, 
pendent from the blossoms. And besides these 



134 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

there were oak, and chestnuts, and sycamores, and 
black wahiuts,and cypresses, and cucumber-trees, 
and locust-trees, sometimes growing singly, and 
at others forming a copse or grove, or else fring- 
ing the banks of some narrow stream that trav- 
ersed the great plain. 

The wild fruits, again, were as luxuriant as 
the wild flowers themselves. There were prairie 
plums, and wild grapes, and wild strawberries, 
and gooseberries, and hazel-nuts, and mulberries, 
and, indeed, a hundred other forest dainties, that 
were rotting for want of the hand to pluck them. 

Moreover, to complete the feast, there were 
wild-fowl forever flitting in long processions 
through the air. Now there would come a flock 
of wild turkeys sweeping overhead ; then a cloud 
of wild pigeons, thick as migrating swallows, 
would shadoAv the plain ; and these would be suc- 
ceeded in a while by troops of long-necked geese 
upon the wing, or long-legged cranes, or huge 
wild swans, or else a dark multitude of wild ducks, 
or other 'water-fowl. 

Farther, the plains themselves were dappled 
with herds of wild cattle. Far in the distance a 
black mass of bufialoes might be seen cropping 
the luxuriant herbage. Nearer, the deer, startled 
by the howl of the prairie dog, rushed, swift as a 
sheaf of rockets, across the scene. 

In one part were wild horses, thick as at a fair, 
grazing together; in another, a group of long- 
billed pelicans wading in the crossing streamlet. 

Nor was the lavish luxuriance of the prairie 
land to be wondered at, situate as it was on the 
banks and near the mouths of the mightiest riv- 
ers in the world ; for the soil of which the great 
plains had been formed had been worn from 
mountains and valleys, abraded from rocks and 
banks hundreds upon hundreds of miles away, and 



HOW TO BE RICH. 135 

this had been washed and levigated by the wa- 
ters that carried it down till the finer particles 
alone remained suspended in the current, so that 
the soft fat " silt" had been deposited there in 
atoms as minute as if myriads of ants had borne 
it thither for thousands of years. And thus the 
plains had grown and grown, layer by layer, and 
acre by acre, flood after flood, from the very start- 
ing-point of time itself, till the alluvial soil had 
become rich and black as a bride-cake, broad as a 
desert, and deep as a lake. 

And yet no human habitation was to be seen 
amid all this spontaneous luxuriance. The patch- 
es of burnt grass, and the litter of bleached bones 
here and there, told of some passing Indian camp ; 
but beyond these there was no sign of man's pres- 
ence, as if the Lord of the Creation had yet to 
take possession of his richest manor, for " there 
was not a man to till the ground" throughout the 
Eden of the New World. 



CHAPTER XIII. 

HOW TO BE RICH. 

As young Benjamin sat munchiug his venison- 
ham on the grass, with the great prairie stretch- 
ing far and wide before him, he noted one after 
another the various phenomena of the scene. 
First his eyes would be riveted for a moment 
upon the endless string of wild-fowl sailing like 
a winged fleet overhead ; then he would watch 
some antlered elk that stood by itself staring into 
the distance ; next he would be taken with the 
bright balls of custard apples dangling from the 
trees ; and the moment after he Avas plucking a 
bunch of the prairie violets, whose perfume came 



136 TOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIX. 

steaming up from the earth beside him, or else he 
was chewing a cud of the honeyed clover at his 
feet. 

Presently he would be up and hurrying off to 
gather the wild plums that his uncle had direct- 
ed his attention to ; and the next minute he'd 
come tearing back from the copse with his little 
three-cornered hat full of the fruit, together with 
bunches of hazel-nuts and grapes, and with pen- 
dents ofcarnehan cherries dangling from his ears, 
as well as a huge tulip-flower, almost as big as a 
golden goblet, stuck in his button-hole. 

The uncle, however, in the brief intervals be- 
tween the boy's flightier moods, pointed out to 
him such of the more latent beauties connected 
with the scene as might otherwise have escaped 
the youth's less observant eye. 

It was a long time, however, before the restless 
lad was tired of running after every bright but- 
terfly novelty of tlie place — long, indeed, before 
he could be in any Avay sobered down into atten- 
tion. The remains of the Indian camp had to be 
explored ; the papaw-tree to be half climbed ; the 
deer to be scared, in the vain hope of feeding 
them ; the wild ducks to be pelted in the air, in 
his eagerness to take a brace back home with 
him ; the tumulus, or Indian " barrow," to be 
scaled ; Jacky, the pony, to be petted and fon- 
dled ; and, indeed, a thousand and one boyish 
freaks to be gone through, ere Uncle Benjamin 
had any chance of being listened to for more 
than a minute or two at a stretch. 

Nevertheless, the uncle knew enough of human 
nature to be aware that a boy's excitement is like 
summer lightning playing for a time in harmless 
fitful flashes, but lasting only while the heat is on. 
So he waited patiently for his pupil to cool down 
a few degrees, to something like " temperate ;'* 



HOW TO BE EICH. IST 

for, like a true artist, the old man was anxious to 
fix his impression while the scene itself was fresh 
before the eye. He sought to teach, indeed, as 
artists sketch, "from Nature," because he had 
long noted how strongly the associations of place 
serve to link together ideas in the memory. 
Hence, in all his counselings, he had ever one 
object in view, which was to make the lesson he 
desired to inculcate, not a mere flitting phantasm 
or shadowy ghost of a truth, but a principle, in- 
stinct with all the vigor of life itself; and to do 
this, he sought to mix it up with some strange 
sight and event of boyhood. In a word, he strove 
to dramatize, as it were, what he had to teach, 
with all the real scenery of time and place, and 
so to interweave it with the web of youthful ex- 
istence, that the mere recollection of the boyish 
adventure should serve to recall with it, in man- 
hood, the golden rule that he wished to be forever 
tableted upon the mind. 

At length, however, the bloom had been brush- 
ed oif the novelty of the scene ; the charm of the 
"strange place" had lost its freshness with the 
familiarity of even an hour or two ; and the lad, 
who at first had run wild as a deer, startled by 
the strange objects about him, became ere long 
quiet and sedate as a lark at sundown. 

The tired boy lay stretched at full length in the 
tall grass, bedded in it, as if couched in a field of 
standing corn. The uncle, who sat with the little 
fellow's head pillowed on his lap, rested his back 
against the trunk of a huge " black walnut"-tree 
that stood by itself on the plain as if it had been 
planted there ; while through the broad foliage, 
the glare of the southern sun came down, soften- 
ed into the shade of a cool greenish light, except 
here and there, where the beams trickled between 



13S YOUNG BENJA3IIN FRANKLIN. 

the leaves, and fell upon the sward in bright lus- 
trous goutes that flickered, amid the dusk of the 
bosky canopy, like a swarm of golden butterflies 
playing about the grass. 

The silence that reigned throughout the vast 
plain was so intense that it cast a half-solemnity 
over the scene. The faint murmur of the distant 
Illinois River was alone to be heard, and this 
came droning through the air with every gust, 
like the dying hum of a cathedral bell. The 
foliage above them, too, occasionally rustled like 
silk in the passing breeze ; and now and then 
the scream of the water-fowl, or the howl of the 
prairie-dog, or lowing of far-off cattle might be 
heard. But beyond these, the wide expanse was 
mute as the sea itself in the deepest calm : not 
the click of a woodman's axe, nor the moan of a 
cowherd's horn, nor the snap even of a distant 
rifle — no, nor, strange to say, the piping of a single 
singing-bird, smote the ear. 

" Now, my little man," began the uncle, " if you 
will but listen to me for a while, you shall learn, 
as I promised you, how to be rich." 

The boy nodded as he looked u]) and smiled in 
his uncle's face, as much as to say that he was 
ready for the lesson. 

"Well, you remember, Ben," he proceeded, 
" that when we went out for our day's fishing, I 
showed you that work was the prime necessity 
of our lives ?" 

" Yes, uncle," exclaimed the youth from out the 
old man's lap, " you said one of three things was 
unavoidable — either work, beggary, or starving ; 
I remember the words well." 

"That's right, my lad," rejoined the elder one, 
as he patted his little pupil's cheek till it glowed 
again with blushes ; " but in such a place as this, 
Ben, there is no need of labor, nor any fear of 
starving either." 



HOW TO BE EICH. 139 

The little fellow stared with amazement at the 
contradiction, and cried aloud, " Then why doesn't 
father give up that nasty candle-making, and bring 
mother and all of us out here to the prairies to 
live without working?" 

" Ay," replied Uncle Benjamin, with a sarcastic 
chuckle, " to live the life of savages, my boy — 
that would just suit your mother and Deborah, I 
know." 

*'But why, uncle," again inquired the simple 
lad, " must we either work or starve in Boston, 
and not here ?" 

"Why, my son," the other made answer, "be- 
cause here the earth is- a natural garden, stored 
with more than a sufficiency for the supply of 
man's animal wants. Here, one has but to stretch 
his hand out, as it were, to get a meal ; but in a 
city, remember, the land bears bricks, and mortar, 
and paving-stones rather than food. But even if 
corn grew in the streets, Ben, the soil of Boston 
couldn't possibly feed the people of Boston ; for 
in Boston city there are hundreds crowded upon 
every acre, so that each acre, however prolific, 
could yield but little more than a loaf a year for 
every mouth." 

" Oh ! I see what you mean, uncle," said the 
nephew, half to himself, as he turned the problem 
over in his mind ; " you mean to say, I suppose, 
that there are so many mouths to feed in Boston, 
and so few in this enormous great place, that there 
is plenty to be got here without any hard work, 
and only just enough there with it." 

" I mean not only tliat^ my little fellow," the 
old man returned, " but what I wish you to un- 
derstand is, that the very necessity for the hard 
work demanded of man in a civilized state arises 
from the number of people gathered together in 
the difierent communities being greater than the 



140 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

earth can naturally — or rather, I should say, spon- 
taneously — support. Here, however, the land 
yields, of its own free-will, such a superabundance 
of natural wealth that man has hardly thought it 
worth his while to begin to appropriate any por- 
tion of it to his own individual use ; hence the 
only labor required in such a place as this is that 
merely of collecting the riches which Nature free- 
ly offers up to her uncivilized children. Here the 
fruit has but to be plucked, and the beasts of the 
field or birds of the air to be slain, to allay the 
cravings of the stomach, so that a hunter's life is 
sufficient to satisfy the common necessities of hu- 
man existence." 

" Oh yes ; and that's the reason, uncle, why 
these prairies are called the 'Indian hunting- 
grounds,' " exclaimed the younger Benjamin, with 
no little delight, as the true significance of the 
phrase flashed across his mind. 

" You will understand, then, my boy," the elder 
continued, " that so long as the children of Nature 
are few in number, and their mother-earth yields 
more than enough for each and all of them, there 
is no appropriation, no scrambling for the world's 
riches, no hoarding of them, no coveting of our 
neighbor's possessions, no theft, nor, indeed, any 
labor for man to perform, harder than that of 
gathering the superabundant food as he may want 
it. Directly, however, the human family begins 
to outgrow the natural resources of the land over 
which it is distributed, then men proceed to seize 
upon the good things of the world, and garner 
them as their own special property, while others 
strive to force the earth to yield by cultivation 
more than the natural supply, so that the more 
savage members of the tribe fall to fighting among 
themselves for the possessions obtained by their 
brothers, and the more peaceable and sedate to 



HOW TO BE RICH. 141 

raise for their own use fruits and grain that the 
soil otherwise would never have borne. Thus, 
then, you see, Ben, that as the world becomes peo- 
pled, and tribes i^ass from a state of nature to civ- 
ilization, there are developed two new features in 
human life — the one, the appropriation of what 
is growing scarce (for no one thinks of gathering 
and hoarding that which is superabundant) ; and 
the other, the production of artificial crops and 
riches, as a means of remedying the scarcity." 

" I think I can make out now what seemed so 
strange to me before, uncle," young Benjamin 
chimed in, as he lay looking up in the old man's 
face ; " the only work required of the wild Indians 
out here is that oi gather ing Xho, fruits of the earth, 
while the farmers and others round about us have 
to produce them." 

" Just so, lad ; and while collection is the easi- 
est form of work, production is a long and labori- 
ous process," added the tutor. 

" So it is," the boy made answer, as the differ- 
ence was clearly defined to him ; " it takes just a 
year for the harvest to come round, and a deal of 
work has to be done before that — eh, uncle ?" 

" Well, then, Ben, the next thing to be consid- 
ered is, How are the laborers to live between the 
crops ?" said Uncle Benjamin, as he led his little 
pupil step by step through the maze of the rea- 
soning. "Collection yields an immediate return 
to the labor; but in production th^ producers 
must wait for the produce, and of course live 
while they are waiting." 

" Of course they must," echoed the youngster ; 
"but then, you know, uncle, they've got all the 
last year's corn to keep them." 

" Yes ; but suppose, my little man, some of 
them made their corn into cakes, and pies, and 
puddings, as well as bread, and so ate up all their 



142 YOUNG BENJAMIN FBANKLIN. 

Stock before the harvest came round again, what, 
then, would be the consequence ?" inquired the 
uncle, watching the effect of the question upon 
the boy. 

" Why, then they'd have to starve, of course," 
was the simple rejoinder, for the youth was still 
unable to detect the drift of the inquiry. 

"Ay, Benjamin, to starve, or else to labor for 
the benefit of those who had been more prudent," 
answered the uncle, still gazing intently at the 
youth as he lay with his head pillowed on the old 
man's lap ; " and thus civihzed society Avould be- 
come divided into two distinct classes — masters 
and men, rich and poor." 

" Oh ! I see," pondered the little fellow, as he 
woke up to the truth ; " the prudent people in the 
w^orld become the rich, and the imprudent make 
the poor." But presently a doubt darted across 
his mind, and he asked, "But is it ahcays so in 
Boston and other towns, uncle ? Are riches got 
only by i:»rudence, and is imprudence the great 
cause of poverty ?" 

" I know what is passing through your brain, 
Ben," interposed the old man, " and I should tell 
you that many persons are certainly born to rich- 
es, while many more inherit a life of poverty, lad. 
In most cases, however, the heritage is the result 
of their parents' or their forefathers' thrift, or the 
want of it. If your father, Ben, chose to make a 
beggar of himself, not only would he suffer, but 
you and your brothers and sisters would become 
hereditary beggars, and, most likely, find it diffi- 
cult in after life to raise yourselves above beg- 
gary." 

" Then the sins of the fathers," murmured the 
thoughtful lad, " are really ' visited upon the chil- 
dren unto the third and fourth generation,' as it 
says in the commandment." 



now TO BE RICH. 143 

" Yes, my little man," the elder Benjamin add- 
ed, " poverty is truly an ' estate in tail.' It de- 
scends from father to son ; and it is supreme hard 
work to ' dock the entail' (as lawyers call it), I can 
tell you. As the mere casualty of birth ennobles 
the son of a noble, so, generally speaking, does it 
pauperize the son of the pauper. The majority 
of the rich have not been enriched by their own 
merits, boy, nor the mass of the poor impoverish- 
ed by their own demerits. As a rule, the one 
class is no more essentially virtuous than the oth- 
er is essentially vicious. The vagabond is often 
lineally descended from a long and ancient ances- 
try of vagabonds, even as the proudest peer dates 
his dignity from peers before the Conquest. The 
heraldry of beggary, however, is an unheard-of 
science. The patrician's pedigree forms part of 
the chronicles of the country ; but who thinks of 
the mendicant's family tree ? And yet, lad, the 
world might gather more sterling wisdom from 
the genealogy and antecedents of the one than the 
other. ' Who was the first beggar in the family ? 
How did he get his patent of beggary ? and how 
many generations of beggars have been begotten 
by this one man's folly or vice ?' These are ques- 
tions which few give heed to, my son, and yet 
they are pregnant with the highest philosophy, 
ay, and the most enlightened kindness." 

The little fellow was too deeply touched with 
the suggestiveness of his uncle's queries to utter 
a word in reply. He was thinking how he should 
Jike to learn from the next beggar he met what 
had made him a beggar — he was thinking of the 
little beggar-children he had seen with their fa- 
ther and mother chanting hymns in the streets of 
Boston, and wondering whether they would grow 
up to be beggars in their turn, and bring their lit- 
tle ones up to beggary also. 



144 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

"Moreover, I should tell yon, lad," continued 
the uncle, after a brief pause, " that in the strug- 
gle of the transition of almost every race from a 
state of barbarism to civilization, possessions are 
mostly acquired by force of arms rather than by 
industry and frugality; for no sooner does the 
scrambling for the scanty wealth begin, than the 
strong seize not only upon the natural riches of 
the earth, but upon the very laborers themselves, 
and compel them to till the land as slaves for their 
benefit. But, putting these matters on one side, 
boy, what I am anxious to impress upon you now 
is, that even supposing right, rather than might, 
had prevailed at the beginning of organized soci- 
ety, and all had started fairly, producing for them- 
selves, why, long before the second harvest had 
come round, some would have eaten up, and some 
would have w^asted their first year's crop, and 
these must naturally have become the serfs of 
those who had saved theirs. Thus, then, the same 
broad distinctions as exist now among men would 
have sprung up, and the human world still have 
been separated into two great tribes — those who 
had plenty of breadstuff, and those who had none ; 
while those who had no food of their own would 
be at the mercy of those who possessed a super- 
abundance ; so that not only would they be glad 
to be allowed to labor for the others' benefit, but 
even constrained to work for the veriest pittance 
that their masters chose to dole out to them," 

Little Benjamin remained silent, conning the 
hard bit of worldly wisdom that had been for the 
first time revealed to him. 

The uncle noticed the impression his words 
had made, and added, " Such, ray Httle man, are 
the social advantages of prudence, and such the 
heavy penalties that men pay for lack of thrift in 
life. But, before we proceed any farther, Ben, 



HOAV TO BE EICII. 145 

let US thoroughly comprehend what this same 
prudence means." 

The boy stared at his uncle as he awaited the 
explanation. 

" In the first place, then," the godfather went 
on, " we must not confound prudence Avith miser- 
liness, nor even with meanness. To be miserly, 
my son, is as improvident as to be prodigal ; for 
to hoard that which is of use chiefly in being 
used — in being used as a means of farther pro- 
duction — is as unwise as to squander it. To do 
this is to live a pauper's life amid riches, and thus 
not only to forestall the beggary that true pru- 
dence seeks to avoid, but to waste the wealth (by 
allowing it to remain idle) that is valuable only 
in being applied as the means of future benefit or 
enjoyment. To be mean, on the other hand, my 
lad, is to be either unjust or ignoble; and en- 
lightened worldly discretion w^ould prompt us to 
be neither, for there is no real prudence in ignor- 
ing the duties, the dignities, or even the charities 
of life." 

" Tell me, then, uncle, what prudence really «s," 
asked the boy, who was half bewildered now that 
he had learned Avhat it was not. 

" Why, prudence, my little fellow, is simply 
that wise worldly caution which comes of fore- 
sight regarding the circumstances that are likely 
to affect our own happiness. Morally considered, 
it is the heroism of enlightened selfishness — in- 
tellectually regarded, it is the judgment counsel- 
ing the heart ; while in a religious point of view 
it is the divine element of ' Providence' narrowed 
down to the limits of human knowledge and hu- 
man vision. The learned man, Ben, exists mainly 
in the past ; the thoughtless one lives only in the 
present ; but the wise dwell principally in the 
future. And as the astronomer foresees the con- 
K 



146 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

junctions of planets, the recurrence of eclipses, 
and return of comets years ere they hapj^en, so 
the true sage, in the great universe of circum- 
stances surrounding our lives, has a prescience 
of the coming good or evil, and makes the bene- 
fits of to-day serve to mitigate the miseries of to- 
morrow." 

" Dear me !" cried the youth, amazed at the 
glowing picture his godfather had given of the 
virtue, " why, I thought prudence merely meant 
saving, uncle." 

"Ay, and you thought saving, doubtlessly," 
added the tutor, sarcastically, "but a poor and 
paltry good after all. Youths mostly do think 
so, Ben ; for it is but natural that to take any 
steps to avert the joerils of old age at a time 
when they are most remote should appear to the 
inexperienced as being, to say the least, most 
premature. Nevertheless, Ben, saving is one of 
the means by which prudence seeks to change 
unusual luck into uniform benefit ; to make the 
strokes of good fortune in the world so temper 
the heavy blows and disasters of life, that our 
days shall be one round of average happiness 
rather than (as they otherwise must be) a series 
of intermittent joys and miseries. But not only 
is it by saving, lad, that the enormities of surfeit 
at one particular time, and of griping want at an- 
other, are converted into the even tenor of general 
sufficiency, but without saving there could be no 
production of wealth in the world." 

" How so, uncle ?" asked the younger Benjamin. 

" Why, boy," the other went on, " in order to 
do any productive work, three things are always 
necessary : first, there must be something to go to 
work upon ; secondly, there must be something to 
go to work with ; and, thirdly, something where- 
with to keep the workman while working — that 



HOW TO BE KICH. 14T 

is to say, the workman, unless duly provided with 
materials, tools, and food, can do no work at all. 
A tailor, for instance, Ben, can not make a coat 
without cloth, or needles and thread ; nor a car- 
penter build a house without a board, or a saw, 
or plane ; nor a smith work without metal, or file, 
or hammer ; nor, indeed, can any handicraftsman 
continue laboring without ' bite or sup' as well." 

" Of course they can't," assented the boy ; " but 
still I can't make out Avhat that has to do with 
saving, uncle." 

" Simply this, lad," the godfather made answer. 
" Such things can be acquired only by husband- 
ing the previous gains ; for if none of the past 
year's yield were to be set aside as stock or cap- 
ital for the next year's supply — if none of the corn 
grown, for example, were to be saved for seed — 
none devoted to the maintenance of the smiths 
while manufacturing the implements wherewith 
to till the soil, and none laid by for the keep of 
the laborers while tilling it, there could not pos- 
sibly be any farther produce." 

" Oh, I see !" the youth exclaimed. " I've often 
heard father talk of the ' capital' required to start 
a person in business, but hardly knew what he 
meant." 

" Yes, boy, I dare say," the other added ; " and 
now you perceive that your father meant by it 
merely the wealth that is required to make tnore 
wealth ; the stock that it is necessary to have in 
hand before any farther supply can be raised. 
Capital, Ben, is nothing more than the golden 
grain which has been husbanded as seed for the 
future golden crop — a certain store of wealth laid 
up for the purposes of farther production or of 
trade ; and such store can be obtained, it is man- 
ifest, only by not consuming all we get. So ab- 
solutely indispensable, too, is this capital, or stock 



14S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

ill hand, for carrying on the great business of Hfe, 
that all who would be the masters of the world 
must themselves either possess a certain portion 
of it, or pay others interest for the use of it ; while 
those who have none, and can get none, must 
needs be the laborers and servants of the others." 

" ' Interest !' " echoed young Benjamin, catch- 
ing at the word he had heard so often used in 
conversation at home, but of which he had as yet 
scarcely formed a definite idea. " But don't some 
people, uncle, live upon the interest of their prop- 
erty without doing any work at all ? Father has 
told me so, I think ; and how can that be, if work, 
as you say, is the prime necessity of life ?" 

" Ay, lad, Ave must either work ourselves or be 
able to employ othei-s to work for us," was the 
rejoinder; "and those who live on the interest 
of their money do the latter, but they do so in- 
directly, rather than directly, like the real employ- 
er himself." 

" I do not understand you, uncle," was all the 
little fellow could say, as he knit his brows in the 
vain attempt to solve the worldly problem. 

" Well, Ben," replied the old man, " I will try 
and make the matter plainer to you. The fund 
that it is necessary to have in hand, in order to 
supply the materials and implements (or, maybe, 
the machinery) required for producing a partic- 
ular commodity, as well as to provide the main- 
tenance of the workmen employed in producing 
it, may either have been acquired by our own 
thrift, or it may have formed part of the savings 
of others. In the one case, of course, we alone 
are interested in the result ; in the other, how- 
ever, it is but fair and right that they who supply 
us with the means of obtaining a certain valuable 
return should be allowed a proportionate share 
or interest, as it is termed, in the gains. If a 



now TO BE EICII. 149 

portion of land be naturally more fertile than an- 
other — if, for instance, the fields in the valley 
yield, with the same amount of labor, a ten-fold 
crop over and above those on the mountains, 
such extra fertility is, of course, a natural boon, 
and this natural boon must accrue to some one. 
Well, if the individual who has acquired the right 
to it do not till the fields himself, it is self-evident 
that he will not part with such right to others 
without reserving to himself some share or inter- 
est in the after-produce. Now this share or in- 
terest that the landlord reserves to himself for 
the superior productiveness of certain lands is 
what the world calls ' rent ;' and your own sense, 
lad, will show you that a person possessing many 
such acres might live merely upon the interest 
he has in the crops that are raised upon them by 
others, rather than by raising any himself" 

" Go on, uncle, go on ; I begin to see it a little 
plainer now," the youth cried, as the fog in his 
brain gradually cleared away. 

" Well, my good boy," proceeded the godfa- 
ther, " capital is as productive as land itself; dis- 
creetly used, it yields crop after crop of profits ; 
and interest for money is but the rent or share 
that the wealthy reserve to themselves for the 
use of their property, when applied to productive 
purposes by others. And as the rent of a large 
number of acres cultivated by tenants may, as I 
said before, yield a person a sufiicient income to 
live in ease and affluence without even the cares 
of conducting the work, or the responsibility of 
good and bad seasons, so a man with many hund- 
reds of guineas may leave the fructification of his 
capital to more active and enterprising natures, 
while he himself subsists in comfort upon that 
mere interest or indirect share in the gains which 
he claims for the use of his savings. If capital 



150 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

were as unproductive as barren land, no one 
would pay interest for the one any more than 
they would dream of giving rent for the other. 
And as the scale of rent is equivalent merely to 
the comparative fertility of different soils, so the 
rate of interest expresses only the value of capital 
in the market, according to the individual risk or 
the general want of money." 

"I see ! I see !" exclaimed the youth. 

" Money makes money, boy," the godfather 
continued ; " it grows as assuredly as the corn 
grows, for the growth of the grain is but the 
fructification of the capital that has been applied 
to the land; and if a hundred guineas sterling 
put into the soil in the shape of seed, manure, 
and wages, will yield at the end of the harvest a 
crop worth say a hundred and twenty guineas, 
surely, then, the money (which, after all, is but the 
ultimate crop reduced to its pecuniary value) has 
fructified at a corresponding rate with the blades 
themselves. A guinea allowed to remain idle, 
Ben, is as bad as land that is allowed to grow 
weeds instead of wheat. Every grain of corn 
eaten, lad, is a grain absolutely destroyed ; but 
every grain sown yields an ear, and every extra 
ear adds to the common stock of food. In like 
manner, wealth squandered is so much wealth 
positively lost to the world ; whereas wealth 
saved, and used as capital in some productive 
employment, serves not only to find work and 
subsistence for the poor, but to increase the gross 
fund of available riches in the community." 

" It is good, then, to save, uncle," observed the 
boy. 

" It is as good to save and use wealth discreet- 
ly, my lad, as it is base to hoard and lock it up, 
and wicked to squander and waste it. Saving, 
indeed, is no mean virtue. Not only does it re- 



HOW TO BE RICH. 151 

quire high self-denial in order to forego the im- 
mediate pleasure which wealth in hand can always 
obtain for its possessors, but it needs as much in- 
tellectual strength to perceive the future good 
with all the vividness of a present benefit as it 
does moral control to restrain the propensities of 
the time being for the enjoyment of happiness in 
years to come. Again, boy, it is merely by the 
frugality of civilized communities that cities are 
built, the institutions of society maintained, and 
all the complex machinery of enlightened indus- 
try and commerce kept in operation. If every 
one lived from hand to mouth, Ben, there could 
be no schools, nor libraries, nor churches, nor 
courts of justice, nor hospitals, nor senate-houses ; 
neither could there be any government, nor law, 
nor medicine, nor any religious or intellectual 
teaching among the people ; for as such modes of 
life add nothing directly to the common stock of 
food and clothing, nor, indeed, to the gross mate- 
rial wealth of a nation, it is manifest that they who 
follow them can do so only at the expense of the 
general savings. Farther, my lad, a moment's re- 
flection will show you that roads, and docks, and 
shipping, and warehouses, and markets, as well as 
factories and shops, together with all the appli- 
ances of tools and machinery, can only be con- 
structed out of the capital stock of the common- 
wealth ; so that the chief difierence between the 
wild luxuriant hunting-grounds before you and 
the great town of Boston in which you live, Ben, 
is that here even Nature herself is so prodigal 
that nothing needs to be stored, while there ev- 
ery thing has sprung out of a wise economy. 
There the very paving-stones in the streets are 
representatives of so much wealth treasured., lit- 
erally, against ' a rainy day,' and every edifice is a 
monument of the industry and frugality of the 



152 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

citizens ; there not a vessel enters the port but it 
comes ladeu with the rich fruits of some man's 
thrift and providence ; there not a field is tilled 
but it is sown with the seeds of another's fore- 
thought, and not a crop raised that is not a gold- 
en witness of the good husbanding of the hus- 
bandman ; there, too, the store-houses are jailed 
up with treasures brought from the very corners 
of the earth to serve as the means of future em- 
ployment for the poor, and the banks sparkle 
with riclies which, rightly viewed, are but the 
bright medals that have been won by the heroism 
of hard work and self-denial in the great ' battle 
of life.'" 

"Has all Boston, then, and all the ships in the 
port and goods in the warehouses," the boy said 
half to liimself, " come out of the savings of the 
people ?" 

"Assuredly they have, lad," was the reply. 
" Just think liow many pounds of bread and meat 
it must take to build a shij), and then ask your- 
self whether there could be a single vessel in Bos- 
ton Harbor if some one hadn't saved a sufficient 
store to keep the woodmen while felling the tim- 
ber, and the shipwrights while putting it togeth- 
er. You see now the high social use of saving, 
Ben. It not only gives riches to the rich, remem- 
ber, but it provides work and food for the poor ; 
for the prosperous man who duly husbands his 
gains benefits at once himself and those who have 
been less lucky or prudent than he. Nor is this 
all. It is by saving alone that a man can eman- 
cipate himself from the primeval doom of life-long 
labor. There are no other means of purchasing 
exemption from the ban. We are the born slaves 
of our natural wants — the serfs of our common 
appetites, and it is only by industry and thrift 
that we can wrest the iron collar from our neck. 



HOW TO BE RICH. 153 

If, then, in the greed of our natures, we will de- 
vour all we get, we must either starve or become 
the voluntary villeins of those who have been 
more frugal than we. By prudence, Ben, I re- 
peat, we may become the masters of the world ; 
by imprudence, we must remain the bondsmen 
of it. In a word, you must save, or be a slave, 
lad." 

'•^Save^ or he a slave^'' the boy kept on murmur- 
ing to himself, for the words had sunk deep into 
his soul. " Save, or be a slave." 

Presently little Ben Avoke up out of the dream 
into which the burden of the song, so to speak, 
had thrown him, and he asked, " But, uncle, can 
people become rich only by saving ? I have heard 
father speak of j^ersons having made large for- 
tunes in a short time ; and when you told me that 
story about Bernard Palissy the potter (you re- 
member, uncle," he interjected, with a smile, " on 
the night when we were becalmed, and I rowed 
you to Boston Harbor), I thought you said Ber- 
nard made — oh, a great, great deal of money, 
merely by finding out how to glaze earthenware." 

" Well said, my child, well said !" nodded the 
godfather; "and that reminds me that I should 
tell you there are two difterent and opposite 
modes of becoming rich : the one slow and sure, 
and the other rapid and uncertain ; the first is the 
process of patient industry and wise prudence ; 
the second that of clever scheming and bold ad- 
venture. A man may certainly invent rather than 
earn a fortune for himself; he may stumble upon 
a gold mine without even the trouble of hunting 
for it ; or he may discover some new mode of pro- 
duction, as Gutenburg, the inventor of movable 
types, did ; or he may insure a vessel that is sup- 
posed to be lost, and see the ship the next day 
come sailing into the harbor ; or he may speculate 



154 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANEXIN. 

for a rise in the market-price of a particular com- 
modity, and realize thousands by the venture ; or 
he may buy a ticket in a lottery, and wake up 
some morning and find himself the lucky holder 
of a twenty-thousand guinea prize ; or, indeed, he 
may do a hundred and one things by which large 
sums of money are occasionally obtained, as it 
were, in an instant." 

" Oh, then," cried the lad, " where's the good, 
I should like to know, of going through years of 
hard work, and stinting and saving, in order to 
get rich, if it's possible to make one's fortune in 
an instant, as you say. I know what I shall do," 
he added, as he sprang to his feet, and faced 
about, elated with the thought, " I shall try and 
discover something, as Palissy the potter did, and 
get a good lot of money by it all in a minute." 

"Ay, <:?o," gravely responded the tutor, "and 
you will be a mere schemer your life through, and 
find yourself most likely a beggar in the end." 

"Well, but, uncle," expostulated the youth, 
".don't you yourself say some people have done 
such things ?" 

" Yes, boy, some have, certainly," was the re- 
ply ; " but in such matters, Ben, success is the one 
splendid exception ; disappointment, failure, and 
beggary the bitter and uniform rule. In all the 
lotteries of life, the chances are a million to one 
against any particular adventurer drawing a prize. 
Some one will be the lucky wight assuredly, but 
then nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand and 
nine hundred and ninety-nine others will as as- 
suredly get blanks. It is only fools who trust to 
accidents or chance ; the wise submit to rule ; 
and the golden rule of life is that scheming and 
adventure fail a thousand fold oftener than they 
succeed, whereas industry and prudence succeed 
a thousand fold oftener than they fail. The one 



HOW TO BE RICH. 135 

mode of amassing wealth," continued the old man, 
" may be tempting from its seeming rapidity, but 
it is far more disheartening in the end, lad, from 
its real uncertainty ; while the other mode, if al- 
loyed with the inconvenience of being slow, has 
at least the crowning comfort of being sure." 

" I see ! I see what you mean now," ejaculated 
little Ben, thoughtfully. 

" Well, then, do you understand now how to 
be rich, my little man ?" the teacher inquired. 

*' Oh yes, uncle," cried the youth, delighted to 
let his tutor see how well he had understood him ; 
" by living on less than we get." 

The godfather smiled as he shook his head, as 
much as to say the lad was at fault somewhere. 
" That is only one part of the process, Ben," pres- 
ently he said. "To live on less than we get is 
merely to hoard, and hoarding is not husbanding. 
To husband well is at once to economize and fer- 
tilize ; it is not only to garner, but to sow and to 
reap also. The good husbandman does not allow 
his acres to lie forever idle, but he uses and em- 
ploys all his means with care, and in the manner 
best suited to produce the greatest yield. To be 
rich, then, my little man, we must not only work 
and get, and live on less than we o-et, but — but 
what, Ben ?" 

" We must use and employ, as you call it, uncle, 
what we save," was now the ready reply. 

" Right, lad," the old man continued ; " we must 
make our savings work as well as ourselves, in 
order to make them useful. Nothing, indeed, 
can be rendered productive without work, and a 
pound becomes a guinea at the year's end merely 
because it has been used as the means of giving 
employment to those who had not a pound of 
their own to go to work upon." 

" But, uncle," exclaimed the lad, with eager- 



156 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

ness, as a seeming difficulty suddenly crossed his 
mind, " how are people to live on less than they 
get if they don't get enough to live upon ?" 

" Ah ! Ben, it is that same phantom of ' enough' 
which is the will-o'-the-wisp of the whole world,'' 
answered the old man. "The boundary to our 
wishes is as illusive as the silver ring of the hori- 
zon to a child at sea: it seems so near and so 
like the journey's end ; and yet, let the bark speed 
on its course day after day, and the voyage be as 
prosperous as it may, there it remains the same 
bright, dreamy bourn — always apparently as close 
at hand, and yet always really as distant from the 
voyager as when he started. There is no such 
quality as enough, lad, in the world. "We might 
as well attempt to wall in all space as to limit the 
illimitable desires of human nature. The capa- 
cious stomach of man's ambition and avarice is 
never surfeited. The merchant prince has no 
more enough than the pauper ; and the man who 
delays saving because he has not enough to live 
upon will never have enough to save upon. Let 
us get never so httle, at least some Httle, even of 
that little, may be laid by, if we %dll but be frugal, 
and a store once raised and duly husbanded will 
soon serve to change the little into more. If we 
have not sufficient moral control to keej) our de- 
sires within our means in one station of life, de- 
pend upon it, lad, such is the expansibility of 
human wishes, that there will be the same lack 
of self-restraint in any other.* The really prudent 

* Benjamin Franklin, the hero of the present book, lived 
to exemplify how little is required for the satisfaction of 
man's wants. His diet, when he was working as a journey- 
man printer in London, consisted merely of 20 lbs. of bread 
a week, or a little more than half a quartern loaf per diem, 
with water, as the French say, a discretion ; and this regimen 
he submitted to, principally, in order to be able to purchase 
books out of the remainder of his wages. 



HOW TO BE RICH. 157 

are prudent under all circumstances ; and those in 
adversity, who wait for prosperity to give them 
the means of laying up a fund for future ease, may 
wait forever and ever, since prosperity can come 
only through the very means they are idly wait- 
ing for. The main object of all saving is redemp- 
tion from poverty, and the poorer the people, the 
greater the reason for their pursuing the only 
course that can possibly bring riches to them, 
and emancipate them from the misery that is for- 
ever hanging over them like a doom. It may be 
hard, Ben, to save under griping necessity, but 
every penny husbanded serves to relax the grip ; 
and, hard as it is, we must ever bear in mind that 
there is no other loophole in the world by which 
to escape from want to comfort, from slavery to 
independence." 

" Ay, uncle, it is as you said, we must save or 
be a slave," returned the little fellow. " I shall 
never think of the prairies without remembering 
the words." 

The lesson ended, it was high time for the 
horses to be resaddled, for already the long shad- 
ows of the solitary clumps of trees had begun to 
stripe the emerald plains, the black bands con- 
trasting with the golden green of the sward, 
burnished as it seemed now with the rays of the 
setting sun, till the meadows shone with all the 
belted brilliance of a mackerel's back. And as 
the couple set out on their journey homeward, 
the little fellow followed, almost mechanically, in 
his uncle's track, for he was still busy, as he jog- 
ged along, revolving the hard truths he had learn- 
ed for the first time in life, and muttering to him- 
self by the way, " Save ! save ! or be a slave." 



158 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 



CHAPTER XIV. 

AN ALARM. 

There was a loud knocking at the shop door 
of the candle-store at the corner of Hanover and 
Union Streets, in the city of Boston — a knock that 
sounded the louder from the lateness of the hour 
and the utter stillness of the streets at the time. 

The Puritan family were on their knees in the 
little back parlor, engaged in their devotions pre- 
vious to retiring to rest for the night; so the 
summons went unheeded. 

"We pray Thee, O Lord," continued the fa- 
ther, as he oftered up the usual extemporaneous 
prayer, and proceeded to ask a blessing for the 
last member of his household before concluding 
the family worship, " to bless our youngest child 
Benjamin. AVatch over him, O God — " 

Again the noisy summons interrujDted the sup- 
plication, but still the prayer went on. 

*' And so strengthen him with Thy grace that 
he may grow up to walk in Thy ways for the rest 
of his life ; and if his body or his soul be in peril 
at this moment, grant, O grant, Ave beseech Thee, 
that the danger may be only for the time." 

"Amen !" fervently exclaimed the mother, rais- 
ing her head from the cushion of the bee-hive 
chair before which she was kneeling. 

Again the knocking was repeated, and this time 
so vigorously that the mother and Deborah both 
started back from their chairs, and would have 
risen from the floor had they not seen that Josiah 
paid little or no regard to the disturbance. 



AN ALABM. 159 

Nor did the father move a limb (though the 
noise at last continued without ceasing till he had 
besought the customary blessing on all his neigh- 
bors and friends, and even his enemies too. 

Immediately the ceremony was finished Dame 
Franklin jumped up and cried, "Who ever can 
want admission here at such a time of the night ?" 

Deborah was no sooner on her feet than she 
ran to her mother's side, and clung close to her 
skirt as she watched her father move leisurely to- 
ward the outer shop door. 

"Be sure and ask who it is before you undo 
the bolt. Josh !" screamed the wife in her alarm ; 
but the words were scarcely uttered ere the voice 
of Uncle Ben was heard shoviting without, "What, 
are you all gone to bed here, eh ?" 

On the door being opened, the younger Benja- 
min flung himself into the arms of his father, and 
smothered the old man's words with kisses, while 
the mother and Deborah no sooner caught the 
sound of the well-known voice than they rushed 
forward to take part in the greeting. 

Then came a volley of questionings : " Where 
on earth have you been to ?" " What have 
you been doing with yourselves all this time ?" 
"Why didn't you say you should be so long gone 
when you started?" "Don't you think it was 
high time for us to get alarmed about you?" 
" What have you seen, Ben ?" asked Deborah, on 
the sly. " How ever did you manage for clean 
clothes ?" chimed in the mother. " You surely 
must have run short of money," interrupted the 
father. 

But, the greeting over, the boy, who since dusk 
had been asleep on board the sloop that had 
brought him and his uncle to Boston, was too 
tired with the long voyage to enter into the many 
explanations demanded of him ; and though the 



160 YOUNG BENJAMIN PKANKLIN. 

mother, mother-like, " was sure he was sinking for 
want of food," young Ben showed such a decided 
preference for bed to bread and cheese, that Dame 
Franklin at length hurried the drowsy lad and 
his sister to their chambers for the night, while 
she herself staid behind to sj^read the cold corned 
brisket and cider for her brother-in-law. 

As the uncle munched the beef, he carried the 
parents as briefly as possible through the several 
scenes of his long journey with the boy ; and when 
he had borne them to the Western prairies, he ran 
over the heads of the lesson he had imj^ressed 
upon the youth there. ISTor did he forget, as he 
brought them back home again, to gladden their 
hearts by telling them how their son had profited 
by the teaching ; how he had kept continually re- 
peating to himself by the ^vay the portentous 
words, "Save, or be a slave;" how each well- 
stocked homestead that they passed had served 
to remind him only of the thrift of the inhabitants ; 
how he had noted, too, in every factory, the long 
course of industry and self-denial that had amass- 
ed the riches to raise it, as well as the enterj^rise 
that had devoted the wealth to such a purpose ; 
and how, as some stray beggar that they chanced 
to meet on the road asked them to " help him to 
a quarter of a dollar," the little fellow (when he 
had given him as much as he could spare) would 
first want to know Avhether he was a born-beggar 
or not, and then proceed to lecture the vagabond 
soundly for liking beggary better than work, and 
preferring to remain the lowest slave of all rather 
than save. 

" Bless the boy !" the mother cried ; " I'm glad 
he gave the poor soul something more than 
words, though. But I always told you. Josh — 
you know I did — that you were mistaken in our 
Ben." 



AN ALARM. 161 

" Have heed, brother, have heed !" was all the 
father said in reply. " Beware lest you beget in 
the lad a lust for 'treasures that moth and rust 
doth corrupt.' " 

" Never fear, Josiah ; I have not done with my 
little godson yet. I know well what I took upon 
myself when I became sponsor for the sins of the 
child, and do you wait till my worldly lessons are 
ended," the uncle made answer. 

" N^ot done with the boy yet, Benjamin !" ex- 
claimed the father. " Why, how much longer will 
you keep him away from earning a crust for him- 
self ? It's high time he should be out in the 
world, for a lad learns more by a day's practice 
than a whole month's precepts." 

" Ay, send him to sea on a mere raft of loose 
principles, c?o," cried Uncle Ben, " do — child as 
he is — without any moral compass to show him 
the cardinal points of the world, or hardly any 
knowledge of the heavens either, by which to 
shape his course : that's the way to insure an easy 
and prosperous voyage for the youngster, certain- 
ly — that's the way to start a boy in life;" and 
the uncle laughed ironically at the notion. 

" But what else do you want to teach the lad, 
Benjamin ?" asked the mother, anxious to prevent 
a discussion at that hour of the night. 

" What else^ Abiah ?" echoed the brother-in- 
law. " Why, I want to make a man of him ; as 
yet I've taught him to be little better than an ant. 
But do you leave him to me only for another 
week, and a fine right-minded little gentleman he 
shall be, I promise you. Now look here, both of 
you : I taught the boy first that he must either 
work, beg, or starve." 

" Good !" nodded Dame Franklin. 

*' Then I taught him how to make his work 
light and pleasant." 

L 



162 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" Good !" repeated the dame. 

" And after that, I taught him how to make 
the produce of his work the means of future ease 
and comfort to him." 

"Very good!" Dame Franklin ejaculated. 

" I've shown him, in fact," added Uncle Benja- 
min, "not only how he must slave in order to 
live, but how, by putting his heart into his labor, 
he may lighten the slavery ; and also how, by con- 
tinual saving, he may one day put an end to all 
farther slaving for the rest of his life." 

" Yes, brother," added the stern old Puritan 
tallow-chandler, "you've taught the boy how to 
become a rich man," and he laid a scornful em- 
phasis upon the epithet. 

" Ay, Josiah, I have," meekly replied the other ; 
" and now I want to teach him how to become a 
good one. I have the same scorn for mere riches 
and money-grubbing as yourself, brother — a scorn 
that is surpassed only by my abomination of will- 
ful beggary and voluntary serfdom. Is there not 
a medium. Josh, between the overweening love 
of wealth and the reckless disregard of it — a mid- 
dle course between a despotic delight in that 
worldly power which comes of riches, and the 
servile abandonment of ourselves to that wretch- 
ed bondage which is necessarily connected with 
poverty ? Surely a man is a dog who loves to be 
fed continually by others ; and there is, to my 
mind, no higher worldliness that a young man 
can learn than to have faith in his own powers; 
to know that the world's prizes of ease and com- 
petence are open to him, if he will but toil dili- 
gently and "lieartily, and husband carefully and 
discreetly. To. teach a lad to be self-reliant is to 
teach him to have a soul above beggary ; it is to 
make an independent gentleman of him, even 
while he is laborino: for his livino;." 



AN ALARM. 163 



" But have a care, brother, I say again, have a 
care of worldly pride and worldly lust," inter- 
posed the j^rimitive old father, gravely. " I would 
rather have my son the meek and uncomplaining 
pauper in his old age, than an overbearing purse- 
proud fool ; the one tired of life and sighing for 
the sweet rest of heaven, and the other so wed- 
ded to the world, and all its pomps and vanities, 
that he wants no other heaven than the gross lux- 
uries of the earth." 

" I detest mere worldlyism. Josh, as much as 
you do," returned his brother Benjamin. "But 
because it is base and wicked to be utterly world- 
ly, it by no means follows that it is noble and 
good to be utterly ^^?^worldly. To despise the 
world about us because there is another and a 
better world to come, is as wrong as not to value 
life because we hope to live hereafter. And as it 
is our duty to promote our health by conforming 
our habits to the laws of bodily welfare, so is it 
our duty to conform our pursuits to the laws of 
worldly happiness — laws which are as much part 
of God's ordination as the conditions of health, 
or the succession of the seasons themselves. The 
laws of worldly life are written on the tablets of 
the world, and the handwriting is unmistakably 
the Creator's own. There was no need of any 
special revelation to make them known to us. If 
we vnll but open our eyes, we may read them in 
letters of light ; and surely they are as much for 
the guidance of our worldly lives as the Biblical 
commandments are for the regulation of our spir- 
itual ones." 

" There is no gainsaying your brother's words, 
Josh," urged the dame, for she was too anxious 
to get to bed to say a syllable that was likely to 
prolong the argument ; and then, by way of a gen- 
tle hint as to the hour, the housewife proceeded 



164 YOUNG BENJAMIN FBANKLIN. 

to place the tin candlesticks on the table before 
the two brothers. 

" Well, Ben, the days of monkish folly are past," 
responded Josiah as he rose from his seat, " and 
people no longer believe that true philosophy puts 
up with a tub for a home. There may be as much 
worldly j^ride, too, in the austerity of a hermit's 
life as in the pomp of Solomon ' arrayed in all his 
glory.' Nevertheless, the heart of man is fond 
enough of the world's gewgaws, without needing 
any schooling in the matter." 

" Can that be truly said, Josiah, so long as three 
fourths of the world remain steeped to the very 
lips in poverty?" Uncle Ben calmly inquired. 
"All men may covet wealth, brother, but that few 
know the way to w4n even a competence is prov- 
en by the misery of the great mass of the people. 
I want to see comfort reign throughout the world 
instead of squalor ; competence rather than want ; 
self-reliance rather than beggary ; independence 
rather than serfdom. I wish to teach a man to 
get money rather than want it or beg for it ; to 
get money with honor and dignity ; to husband 
it with honor and dignity ; and, what is more, 
to spend it with honor and dignity too. And, 
please God, that is the high lesson your boy shall 
learn before I have done with him." 

" Be it so, then, brother, be it so ; and may he 
prove the fine, honorable, and righteous man w^e 
both desire to see him," cried the father. 

" Amen !" added the mother ; and then, w^ith a 
"God bless you," the brothers parted for the 
night. 




rOUNG BEN GIVES UIS SISTER AN ACCOUNT OF HIS TRAVELS. 



THE GREAT RAREE-SHOAV. 1G7 



CHAPTER XV. 

THE GREAT RAEEE-SHOW. 

Young Ben, on the morrow, was a different 
lad from the tired, drowsy, and taciturn Httle 
traveler of the previous night; for no sooner was 
sister Deborah below stairs arranging for the 
morning meal, than he was by her side, following 
her, now to the wood-house, then to the pantry, 
and afterward to the parlor, with a shoe on one 
of his hands and a brush in the other, busily en- 
gaged in the double office of disburdening his 
mind of the heavy load of wonders he had seen 
on his travels, and getting rid at the same time 
of a little of the mud he had brought back with 
him from the country. 

Then, as the girl began to set the basins and 
the platters on the table, he fell to dodging her 
about the room as she rambled round and round, 
and chattering to her the while of the curious old 
French town of St. Louis, but still polishing away 
as he chattered. And though Deborah insisted 
that he must not clean his shoes over the break- 
fast-table, on he went, scrubbing incessantly, with 
his head on one side, and talking to the girl by 
jerks, first of that darling Jacky, the pony they 
had borrowed of the French farmer, and next of 
the " ark" in which they had descended the great 
Ohio River. 

When, too, the boy rehired with the little maid 
to assist her in opening' the store, there he would 
stand in the street, witji one of the shutters in his 
hand resting on the stones, as he described to her 



168 YOTJNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the herd of buffaloes, and flocks of wild turkeys, 
and the deer and pelicans that he had seen in the 
prairies. Nor would he even cease his prattling 
during the boiling of the milk ; for while Debo- 
rah stood craning over the simmering saucepan, 
the eager lad was close against her shoulder, jab- 
bering away, now of the lusciousness of the cus- 
tard apples, then of the delicacy of the prairie 
plums and grapes, and "only wishmg" she had 
been with uncle and himself at their gij^sy-dinner 
off venison-hams and wild fruit in the great hunt- 
ing plains. 

During breakfast, however, both the manner 
and the matter of the boy's discourse were 
changed ; for no sooner did the father and moth- 
er make their appearance, than the little fellow 
grew graver in tone, and talked only of such 
things as he fjincied his parents would be glad to 
liear from him. In his desire, however, to let his 
father see the new man he had become, and what 
fine principles he had acquired by his journey, the 
boy, boy-like, went into such raptures upon the 
art of money-making, and the use of capital in the 
world, that the simple-minded old Puritan kept 
shaking his head mournfully at his brother Ben 
as he listened to the hard, worldly jDhilosophy — 
for it sounded even ten-fold harder and harsher 
from the lips of the mere child expounding it. 
So, when the exigencies of the shop summoned 
the candle-maker from the table, Josiah could not 
refrain from whispering in the ear of the elder 
Benjamin, as he passed behind his chair, " You 
have a deal to do and to undo yet, brother Ben, 
before you make a fine man of the lad." 

But once alone with his mother, the little fellow 
was again a different boy ; for then, as he jumped 
into her lap, and hugged the dame (much to the 



THE GREAT EAREE-SHOW. 169 

discomfiture of her clean mob-cap and tidy mus- 
lin kerchief), he told how he had made up his 
mind to become a rich man, and how happy he 
meant to make them all by-and-by ; how she was 
to have a " help" to do all the work of the house 
for her; how he meant to buy Deborah a pony 
(just like dear old Jacky) with the first money he 
got ; and how Uncle Benjamin Avas to live with 
them always at the nice house they were to have 
in the country, with a prime large orchard to it ; 
and how, too, he was to purchase a ship for Cap- 
tain Holmes (it wouldn't cost such a great deal 
of money, he was sure), so that the captain might 
have a vessel of his own, and take them with him 
sometimes to any part of the world they wanted 
to see. All of which it dearly delighted the 
mother's heart to hear, not because she had the 
least faith in the fond plans of the boy ever being 
realized, but because his mere wish to see them 
all happy made her love him the more. 

At last it was Uncle Benjamin's turn for a tete- 
d-tete with the little man (for the household duties 
soon called the dame away from the parlor) ; 
whereupon the godfather proceeded to impress 
upon his pupil the necessity of conti-ming their 
lessons with as little delay as possible, telling him 
that his father had given them only another week's 
grace, and adding that there was much still for 
the little fellow to learn in the time. 

" What ! more to be learned, uncle ?" cried the 
astounded youth, who was under the impression 
that he was well enough crammed with worldly 
wisdom to be started in life at once. "Surely 
there can be nothing else for a fellow to know. 
Why, you've taught me how to get on in the 
world, and how to end as a rich man too, and 
what more a chap can want I'm sure I can't 



170 TpUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" Of course you can't, little Mr. Clear-sighted," 
replied the uncle, as he seized his godson by the 
shoulders, and shook him playfully as he spoke. 
"I've taught you how to get money, lad, but 
that's only the first half of life's lesson ; the main 
portion of the problem is how to spend it." 

" Well, that is good !" laughed out young Ben- 
jamin, tickled with the apparent ludicrousness 
of any lessons being needed for such a purpose. 
" Why, every boy in the world knows how to do 
that^ without any teaching at all." 

"It comes to him as naturally as a game at 
leap-frog, I suppose," quietly interjected the god- 
father, with a smile. 

" Of course it does," the youngster rejoined. 
"Now you just give me half a dollar, uncle," he 
added, grinning at the impudence of his own 
argument, "and I'll soon let you see that jTknow 
how to spend it." 

" Soh ! you'd spend it directly you got it, would 
you ; eh, you young rogue ? Is that all the good 
that is to come of our long journey to the prai- 
ries?" ejaculated the godfather, as he cujSfed the 
lad, first on one side of his head and then on the 
other, as sportively and gently as a kitten does a 
ball. 

" Oh no;— no, to be sure, uncle," stammered out 
the abashed youngster ; " that is, I meant to say, 
I — I should put it by and save it, of course." 

" What, hoard it, eh ?" dryly observed the oth- 
er, as he eyed the lad over the top of his specta- 
cles, that were almost as big as watch-glasses. 

" No, no. I didn't mean that, either. You're 
so sharp at taking a chap up. I meant to say" 
(and the boy, to set himself right, shook himself 
almost as violently as a Newfoundland dog just 
out of the water), " I — I should put the money in 
the savings-bank, and let it grow and grow there 



THE GEEAT RAREE-SHOW. ITl 

fit interest, just as you said the corn does, you 
know, uncle." 

" Well, what then, lad ?" asked the old man. 

" Why then I should keep on putting more to 
it as fast as I got it, and let it all go on increasing 
together," was the ready answer. 

" Well, and what then ?" inquired Uncle Ben. 

"Why, when I'd saved up enough, I should 
use it as capital to start me in some business, and 
so make it the means of getting me more money," 
responded the youth, who was now able to recall 
the previous lesson. 

" Well, and what then ?" the old man demand- 
ed once more. 

" Why then — then — oh, then I should get more 
money still, to be sure. But what makes you 
keep on saying ' Well, and what then ?' in such 
a tantalizing way as you do, uncle ?" added the 
pupil, growing impatient under the continued 
questioning. 

" Yes ; and when your capital had yielded you 
' more money still,' as you say, what then, lad ?" 
persisted the catechist. 

" Why then I should give u]^ business altogeth- 
er — and — and enjoy myself Yes, that's what I 
should do, I can tell you," was the candid reply. 

"Ay, boy, enjoy yourself!" echoed the elder 
Benjamin, with a sarcastic toss of the head; "ew- 
joy yourself! that is to say, you'd proceed to 
spend the Avealth that it had cost you the labor 
of a life to accumulate. Or maybe you'd spend 
only the interest of your money, though that is 
almost the same thing ; for the interest, duly hus- 
banded, would make your stock in hand grow 
even greater still." 

" Well, there's no harm in a fellow enjoying 
himself after he's done his work, is there ?" the 
bewildered youth demanded, in a half surly tone. 



1T2 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" True, Ben, there is no harm in enjoyment that 
brings no harm with it either to ourselves or oth- 
ers," responded the mentor. " But you see, my 
little man," he went on, " the end of the argu- 
ment is the same as the beginning ; the last ques- 
tion is but a repetition of the first : ' When you've 
got your money, what will you do with it?' 
Spend it, you say ; and spend it you, or some one 
else, assuredly will in the long run. Such is but 
the natural result of all money-getting. We be- 
gin with saving, and finish at the very point which 
we avoid at starting, only that we may have more 
money ultimately to spend. Still, therefore, the 
query is, IToio will you spend your money when 
you've got it? In what manner will you enjoy 
yourself, as you call it?" 

The boy stared in his uncle's face as much as to 
say what ever is he driving at. 

However, the old man paid no heed to the won- 
derment of the lad, but proceeded as follows: 
" The means of enjoyment, my son, are infinite in 
the world ; some of these are purchasable, and 
others not to be had for money. Creature com- 
forts and articles of luxury, for instance, may be 
bought, but these are among the lowest and most 
transient of human j^leasures ; whereas love, the 
purest and most lasting of all earthly happiness, is 
beyond all price. We can no more bargain for 
that than we can for the sunshine which is sent 
down from heaven to gladden alike the poorest 
and the richest of mankind. Nevertheless, none 
but an ascetic will deny that money is one of the 
great means of pleasure in this life ; and if the 
end of money-getting be to obtain an extra amount 
of enjoyment in the world, surely we can not mar- 
ket well, and get a good pennyworth for our pen- 
ny, unless we know something about the diiferent 
qualities of the article we are going to purchase. 



THE GKEAT BAREE-SHOW. 1T3 

If we can not distinguish between what is really 
good and what is comparatively worthless, how 
shall we prevent being cheated ? And if we do 
get cheated of our prize in the end, after all our 
toil and trouble, all our stinting and saving, why, 
then the labor of a whole life is wasted." 

" But, uncle," young Beujamin interjected, 
" surely every body knows what is pleasure to 
them without any teaching at all." 

" They do, Ben — instinctively ; but what they 
do not know is what they have never given per- 
haps a moment's thought to, namely, the ditfer- 
ent forms of pleasure of which their natures are 
susceptible. In their greed to have their fill of 
the first gratification that has tickled them, they 
have never paused to weigh one form of enjoy- 
ment with another — never staid to learn which 
yields the purest delight for the least cost, or 
which has the smallest amount of evil, or the 
greatest amount of good connected with it. What 
is pleasant to one person is often foolish, or even 
hateful to another ; and it is so simply because the 
sources ol happiness appear difierent, not only to 
difierent minds, but even to the same mind at dif- 
ferent periods of life. What the child likes the 
graybeard despises ; what the fool prizes the sage 
scorns. You will understand by-and-by, my boy, 
that the art of spending money wisely is even 
more difficult than the art of getting it honorably." 

"I think I can see a little bit of ^ what you 
mean, uncle," added the youngster ; and then, aft- 
er a slight pause, he asked^ " But how are you 
going to impress the lesson, as you call it, upon 
me this time — eh, unky ?" he inquired, in a coax- 
ing tone, for he was satisfied his godfather had 
some new sight in store for him by way of en- 
forcing the precept. 

" I am going to show you this time, Ben, a cu- 



lU YOUKG BENJAMIN FBANKXIN. 

rioiis collection of animals. I.purpose taking you 
through our great Museum of Natural History," 
said the old man. 

" Oh, thank you, dear unky, thank you !" ex- 
claimed the delighted pupil, as he rose and curl- 
ed his arm about his uncle's neck. " Are we to 
set off to-day ? I'm so fond of seeing animals, you 
don't know. Shall we see any monkeys, unky, eh ?" 

"Ay, scores, boy, scores ! bears and sloths too; 
wild asses and laughing hyenas ; mocking-birds 
and gulls; butcher-birds and scavenger-birds as 
well," Uncle Benjamin made answer, with a sly 
smile twitching at the corners of his mouth. 

The boy chafed his hands together in anticipa- 
tion of the treat as he cried, "Oh, ivo^i^t it be jolly 
—that's all !" 

" But, Ben, the animals I shall show you are not 
preserved in glass cases," the old man added. 

"Ah! that's right. I can't bear those stupid 
stuffed things. I like them to be all alive and 
roaring, I do," was the simple rejoinder. 

" Nor are they confined in cages, with learned 
names, descriptive of the order and family they 
belong to, stuck up over their dens. No natural- 
ist as yet has classified them ; none given us a 
catalogue of their habits, or of the localities they 
infest;" and, as the godfather concluded the 
speech, the boy looked at him so steadfastly in 
the face that the old man Avas unable to keep 
from laughing any longer. 

" Come, come, now," cried the lad, " you're hav- 
ing a bit of fun with me, sir, that you are. I 
shouldn't wonder but that they are no animals 
after all." 

" Animals they assuredly are, Ben," responded 
the uncle, " but tame ones, and to be seen almost 
every day in that strangest of all menageries, hu- 
man society." 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 176 

" Oh ! then they're nothing but men, I sup- 
pose. What a shame of you now, unky, to make 
game of a chap in such a way !" was all that the 
disappointed lad could murmur out, as he drew 
his arm, half in dudgeon, from round the old man's 
neck. 

" Well, lad," the other remonstrated, " the men 
I wish to show you are as much natural curiosi- 
ties in their way as any animals ever seen at a 
fair; and as you can find delight in gazing at a 
monkey cage, and watching the tricks and antics 
of creatures that bear an ugly resemblance to 
yourself, so, among the strange human animals 
that I shall take you to see, you may observe the 
counterpart of your own character portrayed as 
in a distorting glass, and behold in the freaks and 
follies of each the very mimicry of your own na- 
ture, witli your own destiny, if you will, apad be- 
fore your eyes." 



CHAPTER XVI. 

PLEASURE-HUNTING. 

The couple were not long starting on their cu- 
rious errand. 

Little Ben was perhaps even more bewildered 
than he had ever been. What could his uncle 
want to show him a lot of queer, strange men 
for? and what could they possibly have to do 
with teacliing him how to spend his money ? 

Still there was some novelty to be seen, and 
the sight involved an excursion somewhere; so 
there was stimulus enough to make the boy any 
thing but an unwilling party to the expedition. 

The uncle, on the other hand, was busy, with 
very different thoughts as the two trotted through 



1T6 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

the streets of the town. He had so much to show 
the little man, and in so short a time too, that he 
was at a loss how to shape the heterogeneous 
mass of curiosities into any thing like method. 

Ilrst the old gentleman would turn down one 
street, then stop suddenly in the middle of it, and 
after gnawing at his thumb-nail, with his head on 
one side like a cat at a fish-bone, dart off quite as 
suddenly in a diametrically opposite direction. 
Next he thought it would be better to begin this 
way ; " and yet no !" he would say to himself, as 
he halted a second time, and stared for a minute 
or two intently at the paving-stones — " that way 
we shall have to go over the same ground twice;" 
so he decided he would take the lad first to see 
that old — and yet, " stay again !" said he ; " we 
ought by rights to see that one last of all." And 
accordingly the route was altered once more, and 
little Ben had to wheel round after his uncle for 
the fourth or fifth time, and make straight away 
for some other quarter of the city. 

Then, as the old man kept hurrjang along, suck- 
ing the handle of his cane in his abstraction, and 
indulging in a rapid succession of steps as short 
and quick as a waiter's, he was continually talk- 
ing to himself, muttering either, " Let me see ! 
let me see ! where does that queer old fellow live 
now?" or saying to himself, "Didn't somebody 
or other tell me that Adam Tonks had left the 
cellar he used to rent in Back Street ?" or else he 
was mentally inquiring in what quarter of the 
town it was he had met with some other odd 
character some time back. 

At length, however. Uncle Benjamin had made 
up his mind to introduce the boy to the curiosi- 
ties of his acquaintance just as they fell in their 
way, and trust to circumstances, as they went the 
rounds of the town, either to recall or present to 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 177 

them such peculiarities as he wished to bring un- 
der the observation of his Httle pupil. 

" Now remember, Ben," he said, in a half whis- 
per, as he stood on the door-step of the first house 
he was about to visit, with the latch in his hand, 
" remember, I am not going to show you any hu- 
man monstrosities, nor any of the more extrava- 
gant freaks of nature among mankind, but merely 
to let you see some of the broadly-marked differ- 
ences of character in men ; to show you, indeed, 
in how many diverse ways human beings can 
spend their money — or, what is the same thing, 
their time ; to point out to you what different 
notions of pleasure there are among the tribe of 
so-called rational creatures, and how, though all 
the big babies in the world are running after the 
same butterfly, they pursue it like a kno^t of school- 
boys, dodging it in a hundred different ways, and 
each believing, as he clutches at the bright-colored 
little bit of life, that he has got it safe within his 
grasp." 

Rational Animal No. 1.* 

" Give me joy. Master Franklin !" cried a little 
bald-headed man, who was busy at a table, as the 
couple entered the room, unpacking the contents 
of Avhat seemed to be an enormous green sand- 
wich-box, filled with grass and Aveeds. Indeed, 
so busy was the host with the green stuff spread 
before him, that he no sooner withdrew his palm 
from the grasp of the uncle than he set to work 
again examining minutely the little wild flower 
he held in the other hand. " Give me joy, I say ! 
I have discovered the only specimen of the poten- 
tilla^ or common silver-weed, that has yet been 
found in the New World. There it is, sir ;" and 
the old man held it tenderly between his finger 
* See Frontispiece. 
M 



178 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

and thumb, as he eyed it with increased pride ; 
"and a I — I — lovely specimen it is, I can assure 
5^ou. Now you wouldn't believe it, perhaps, but 
I wouldn't take a thousand guineas for that^ mere 
weed as it is. Only think of that, my little chap — 
a thousand guineas ;" and he laid his hand upon 
young Benjamin's head as he spoke. "A good 
deal of money that, isn't it, my little man ? But 
I've been hunting after that same weed for years 
— many years, my dear boy — and traveled, I dare 
say, thousands of miles in search of it. I knew it 
must exist in North America somewhere, and I 
w^as determined to go down to posterity as the 
discoverer of it," and the little ferrety man beat 
the air with his fist as he said the words. " So 
you see what patience and perseverance will do, 
my good l^d. 

" What are you going to be, eh ?" he inquired. 
" Ha ! they should make a botanist of a fine little 
fellow like you, with a head like yours. No pur- 
suit like that in the world — the greatest pleasure 
in life — hunting after the wild flowers and plants ; 
always out in the open air, either up on the hills 
or down in the valleys, or wandering by the 
brook-side, or along the beautiful lanes, or else 
buried in the woods. You'd have to go fine long 
walks into the country then, my little man ; but 
you like walking, I suppose. Bless you, I'm out 
for weeks at a time, and think myself Avell repaid 
for all my trouble if I can only bring home a rare 
specimen or two. Look here, little what's-your- 
name," he went on, talking so fast to the boy that 
the Avords came tumbling one over the other out 
of his mouth ; " here is a little bit of my handi- 
work." And the botanist slid from the top of 
an old bureau near him a large folio volume, con- 
sisting of sheets of cartridge paper bound togeth- 
er, and then spreading it open at one side of the 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 179 

table, he showed the lad that there was a dried 
and flattened plant stuck upon every page. 
*' There .^" he cried, exultingly, with such an em- 
phasis upon the word that it sounded like a deep 
sigh, " look at that^ my man ! but it hasn't a 
twentieth part of the plants I've collected in my 
time ; though where's the wonder ? I've been at 
it all my life — ever since I was a boy of your age, 
and walked thousanc^-s and thousands of miles, 
ay, and spent hundreds upon hundreds of guineas 
to complete my collection. There, my fine fel- 
low, that's the Campanula sylvestris^'' he con- 
tinued, chattering as he turned over the pages be- 
fore the boy; "that's the Crambe marithna^ or 
common sea colewort, and a very fine specimen 
too." And so he kept gabbling on until Uncle 
Benjamin thanked the old gentleman for his kind- 
ness to the lad, and said they would not intrude 
on his time any longer. 

Rational Animal I^o. 2. 

" What, Adam ! in the old state, eh ?" cried 
Uncle Benjamin, as he and his nephew descended 
the steps of a dark cellar in one of the back streets 
of Boston, and found a man there asleep as he sat, 
with his unkempt head resting on his elbow, at 
the edge of a small deal table, and with a piece of 
salt fisii lying untouched on a broken plate by his 
side. 

The uncle had to shake the sleeper violently to 
rouse him, whereupon the man stared, with his 
bloodshot eyes, vacantly at his visitor for a time, 
and then, with a scowl, flung his head back upon 
his arm as he growled out, "Well, and if I am in 
the same state, what's that to you ? You don't 
pay for the jacky, do you? Besides, you like 
what I hate — psalm-singing ; and I like what you 
hate — a drop of good stuflf— like they sell at 'The 



180 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

Pear-tree' round the corner. I>wn vivimus viva- 
mus is my motto, and you don't know what that 
means, Master Franklin, for a pot now. Come, I 
say, mate, are you game to stand a quartern for a 
fellow this morning — yuck ?" and, as the man 
said the words, he raised his head again ; and 
then little Benjamin (for the boy's eyes had got 
used to the dusk of the place by this time) could 
see that the drunkard's cl6thes hung in tatters 
all about him, while his dark, unshaven beard con- 
trasted with his blanched face as strongly as the 
black muzzle of a bull-dog. 

" I ask your pardon. Master Franklin, for mak- 
ing so free," the sot added, in a wheedling tone ; 
" but, you see, I had a little drop too much last 
night," the man went on, " and I sha'n't be quite 
right till I get just a thimbleful or so of the neat 
article inside of me." 

" I'd as lief pay for a quartern of poison for 
you, Adam," said Uncle Benjamin, mournfully. 

" You Avould, would you ?" roared the other, 
springing up like a wild beast from his lair, and 
clutching the broken back of the chair on which 
he had been sitting ; and he was preparing to 
strike his visitor down with it, but he staggered 
back lumpishly against the wall. 

The boy flew to his uncle's side, and whispered, 
" Oh, come away, pray do, uncle ! I have seen 
enough here !" 

The uncle, however, swept past the youth, and 
going toward the dram-drinker, said kindly, 
" Adam ! Adam ! think of the man you once 
were." 

The drunkard's head dropped upon his bosom, 
and the next minute he fell to whining and weep- 
ing like a child. Presently he hiccoughed out 
through his sobs, " I do think of it — yuck ! — and 
then I want drink to drown the cursed thoughts. 



PLEASUEE-HUNTING. 181 

Come, now, old friend," and he vainly tried to lay 
his hand on Uncle Benjamin's shoulder, "send 
the youngster there for just a noggin — only one, 
now — from ' The Pear-tree,' and then I shall be 
all right again." 

The friend shook his head as he replied, " You 
won't, Adam ; you'll be all wrong again — as 
wrong as ever, man. Isn't it this drink that has 
beggared you, and despoiled you of your fortune, 
and of every friend too — but myself? and yet you 
are so mad for it still that you crave for more." 

"I do — I do thirst for it; my tongue's like a 
bit of red-hot iron in my mouth now with the 
parching heat that's on me. I tell you it's the 
only thing that can put an end to care, and (sing- 
ing) drown it in the bo-wo-wole. 

" Chorus — We'll drown it — yuck ! — in the bo- 
wo-wole. Ha ! you should have seen Adam lasht 
night. Blessh you, I was as jolly as a shand-boy 
— the d'light of the whole tap-room. I tipped 
'em some of my best songs — vain songs as you 
call 'em — and you know I always could sing a 
good song if I liked. Master Franklin. Come, 
I'll give you a stave now if you'll only send — 
yuck ! — for that little drop of jacky. The young- 
ster here, I dare say, would like to hear me — 
wouldn't you, my dear .^" (but as there was no 
answer, he added), "What! you won't send for 
the gin ? Well, then, leave it alone, you stingy 
old psalm-singing humbug ; I wouldn't be behold- 
en to you for it now if you were to press it on 
me. But never mind ! never mind ! never mind ! 
May — may — what the deuce is that shentiment ?" 
(and he rubbed his hair round and round till it 
was like a mop) : " tut ! tut ! and it's such a fa- 
vorite shentiment of mine, too, after a song. 
Well, all I know is, it's something about, may 
something or other — yuck! — never shorten friend- 



182 YOUXG BEXJAMIX FEAXKLIN. 

ship. But never mind ! never mind ! Lawyer 
Muspratt is going to sell that little reversion I'm 
entitled to on my maiden aunt's death ; it's the 
only thing I've got left now — but never mind ! 
never mind ! — and then won't Adam Tonks and 
the boys at ' The Pear-tree' have a night of it ! 
Yes, ' dimi vivhims mvamus' is my motto — yuck ! 
—if I die for it." 

The man was silent for a minute or two, and 
then he said, as if waking up from a dream, 

" I wonder who ever it was saw me down the 
cellar steps last night. But never mind ! never 
mind ! who's afraid ? — not Adam Tonks, not he. 
Come, friend Franklin — for you have been a right 
good friend to me often, that you have, old cock 
— if you won't send for that drop of jacky out of 
your own pocket, will you lend me half a dollar 
to get it myself — yuck? I'll give it you back 
again when the reversion's shold. Oh, honor 
bright ! — yuck ! — honor bright, friend !" 

" If it was for food, Adam, you should have it 
and welcome," was the plain answer. 

"Food be cursed!" shouted the madman, again 
roused to a fury; "there's that bit of stinking 
salt -fish I've had for the last week as a relish, just 
to pick a bit ; there, you can carry it home with 
you — you can, you Methodistical old hunks ; take 
it with you ;" and, with a violent effort, the man 
flung the piece of dried haddock toward Uncle 
Benjamin; but so wide of the mark, and with 
such a sweep of the arm, that it struck the wall 
against which the drunkard himself kept swaying. 

Whereupon the godfather, in obedience to the 
boy's repeated entreaty, took his departure. 

Rational Animal Xo. 3. 

The couple were soon in one of the most fash- 
ionable streets of the town ; and in another min- 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 183 

ute little Ben stood in the middle of a grand sa- 
loon, Avheeling round and round as he gazed with 
uplifted eyes, first at the huge mirrors reaching 
from the ceiling to the floor, then at the pictures 
that covered the other parts of the walls, and 
then taken with the marble busts and figures that 
were ranged in different corners of the room. 
" The chairs are all gold and satin, I declare ; and 
the tables and cabinets of different-colored woods, 
worked into the most beautiful patterns; and. 
the chandeliers, too, just like clusters of jewels," 
thought the astonished lad to himself. 

" Who are we going to see here, uncle ?" he 
said, in a whisper to the old man, as he twitched 
his uncle timidly by the skirt. 

Presently the door of an anteroom was flung 
open, and a voice drawled out, " Kem iu, Frank- 
lin, kem in ; I don't mind you. I've only got my 
knight of the goose and kebbage here, and you 
would hardly believe the trouble I have with 
these varlets : half my time is taken up with them, 
I give you my Avad, Franklin, and that merely to 
prevent them turning me out aw — aw — perfect 
skeyarecrow. A man of your fine kimmon sense 
knows as well as any body, Franklin, that appear- 
ance is every thing to a man who — aw — aw, the 
wald is keyind enough to regeyard as aw — aw — 
an arbiter elegeyantiarum, I believe I may say, 
Franklin, eh ? for, thank the powers, the coarsest- 
minded, inimy I have in the wald couldn't say that 
Tam Skeffington isn't, and always has been, the 
best-dressed man in all Boston. I know well 
enough, Franklin, that with persons of your per- 
suasion (by-the-by, can I offer you a kip of choc- 
olate, or a gless of Tokay ? oh, don't say No), 
with persons of your persuasion dress is utterly 
ignored — ut-ttarly. But, deah me ! with a man 
in my station — looked up to, as I said befar, as 



184 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

being something like aw — aw — an arbiter ele- 
geyautiarum in matters of the tilette — only think, 
now, the kimmotion there'd be among the siipe- 
riah clesses of this city if Tam Skeffington was to 
make his appearance in the streets — you'll pardon 
me, Friend Franklin, I know you will — in a coat 
like your own, for exemple !" and the arbiter ele- 
gantiarum was so tickled with the mere straw of 
the joke that he dabbed the patches on his face 
with a handkerchief that was like a handful of 
foam, as he tittered behind it as softly as summer 
waves ripple over the sands. 

Presently he gasped out, between the intervals 
of his simpering, " By-the-by, now, Franklin, do 
permit me, there's a good fellah, just to behold 
myself fcfr one minute in that duffle dressing-gown 
you've kem out in to-day, and to see how you'd 
look in this new plum-colored piece of magnifi- 
cence of mine. I'm sure you'll obleege me, Frank- 
lin, for I give you my wad the double sight would 
throw me into an ecstasy of reptchah." 

The motive of Uncle Benjamin for bringing his 
godson to the house was too strong to make him 
object to an exchange of costume that, under any 
other circumstances, he would assuredly have re- 
fused ; so, to the intense delight of the fine gentle- 
man, and even the attendant tailor, the old Puri- 
tan proceeded to disrobe himself of his own coat 
of humble gray, and to incase his body in the 
gaudy velvet apparel of the beau. 

And when the temporary exchange of gar- 
ments had been duly effected, and the elegant Mr. 
Tam Skeffington beheld himself in the cheval glass 
attired in the quaint garb of the Puritan, and old 
Benjamin Franklin tricked out in the florid cos- 
tume of the exquisite, the sight was more than 
the delicate nerves of the dandy could bear ; for 
he had to retire to the sofa, and bury his head for 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 186 

a while in the squab, or he assuredly would have 
laughed outright. 

The tailor, however, who believed he had nev- 
er seen any thing half so comic in the Avhole of 
his life, chuckled as loud and heartily as a child 
at a pantomime ; nor could he stop himself till 
his more refined customer had demanded "how he 
dairh'd to laff in his presence ;" and even then, 
poor man ! each time he happened to turn round 
and get another peep at the Puritan in the plum- 
colored suit, the laughter would burst out at the 
corners of his mouth with the same noise as the 
froth gushing from beneath the cork of an over- 
excited bottle of ginger-beer. 

Neither could little Benjamin himself refrain 
from joining in the mirth at first, though in a lit- 
tle while the smiles of the lad subsided into frowns, 
as the sense that his uncle was " being made fun 
of" came across his mind. 

In a few minutes the arbiter elegantiarum was 
sufficiently himself to rise from the sofa. " I give 
my wad, Franklin," he said, as he twisted the old 
gentleman round by the shoulders, "you'd punish 
a few of the geyirls at a dannse at the State House 
in a coat like that — you would, even at your time 
of life, I give you my wad (Do you snuff, Frank- 
lin ? — it's the finest Irish bleggeyard, I assure 
you) ; and I mean to play the same havoc with 
the poor things, I can tell you," he went on, as 
the tailor helped them one after the other to ex- 
change coats once more ; " for if they can with- 
stand Tam Skeffington in that plum-colored piece 
of magnificence, why then they've hearts as im- 
penetrable as sand -bags; and heaven knows I 
don't find that the case with the deah creachyos 
generally ; for I'm sure they're good and keyind 
to me. Master Franklin, they are indeed, I give 
you my wad; though they know, I believe, my 



186 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

greatest pleasure is to afford them one moment's 
happiness, and there isn't a lovely woman in the 
Wald that Tarn Skeffington is not ready to lay 
down his life for — his life, Franklin. I'm snre 
only last year it cost me a fortune in trinkets, and 
essences, and bouquets for the sweet creachyos. 
But then, you know, Franklin, a man in yny posi- 
tion — a man who is allowed to be — by both sexes, 
I believe I may say — a j^erson of some little taste, 
and, thank the powers, of some little refinement 
too — a man like myself, I say, key ant spend his 
money on terrumpery ; that, you see, is the pen- 
alty one has to pay for being an aw — aw — arbiter 
elegeyantiarura^ as I said befar. And yet, after 
all, surely such a title is the proudest that can be 
bestowed upon a gentleman; surely it's some- 
thing to have lived for, Franklin, eh ? to have 
gained that much — to be the admired of all ad- 
mirers, as Hamlet has it; for who would not 
rather be the jiotentate of fashion and haut ton — 
the supreme authority in all matters of good taste 
and elegance — the dictatah of superiah mannahs 
and etiquette — than even be like this same famous 
Petah the Great that every body is talking about 
now — the monarch of a million savages ? But 
perhaps your little boy here," he added, with the 
faintest indication of a bow to young Benjamin, 
" would like to see the pictyahs, and statues, and 
objects of vertu^ and knick-knacks in the next 
room." 

And then, as the arbiter elegantiarum opened 
the door for them, he continued, " You'll find, I 
believe, some rather ch'ice works of art among 
them — at least the wald tells me so^and heaven 
knows I've nearly ruined myself in forming the 
kellection." 

Then, still holding the door for the couple to 
pass through, he bowed profoundly as they made 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 18T 

their exit, the dandy saying the while, " Your 
obeejent humble servant. Master Franklin, your 
humble servant to kemmand." 

Rational Animal No. 4. 

" Who's there ? who's there, I say ?" shouted 
an old man. 

" Who-o-o's there ? who-o-o's there, I say ?" was 
screamed out, in the shrill treble of senility and 
fright, from behind the garret door at which Un- 
cle Benjamin and his little companion were pres- 
ently knocking. 

" Come, Jerry ! Jerry ! we're no robbers, man 
alive; it's Benjamin Franklin, of the Hanover 
Street Conventicle, come to see yon," shouted the 
uncle through the chink of the door, as he rattled 
impatiently at the latch. 

There was a sound of jingling metal and a hur- 
ried shuffling within the room, accompanied with 
a cry of " I'll open the door directly. Friend Frank- 
lin — I'll open it directly," said the speaker, with 
a sniggle of affected delight. 

" The old fellow's scrambling together his mon- 
ey to hide it before we go in," whispered the god- 
father in the ear of the lad. 

In a minute or two they could hear the gaffer 
gasping away as he endeavored to remove the 
heavy bar from behind the door, and saying the 
while, in the same forced giggling tone as before, 
" Dear heart ! dear heart ! I quite forgot the door 
was barred, to be sure." 

Once within the room, little Ben found the mi- 
ser's garret even more squalid and poverty-strick- 
en than the drunkard's cellar. The broken win- 
dow-panes were stuffed with bundles of dirty 
rags, and the principal light that entered the lit- 
tle dog-hole of a home dribbled in through the 
cold blue gaps in the roof. The plaster had fallen 



188 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

in large patches from the walls, and left huge ul- 
cerous-looking blotches there, while the flooring 
in places was green and brown as rusty copper 
from the soddening of long-continued leakage 
through the tiles. 

In one corner of the apartment there was a hil- 
lock of mouldy crusts, spotted Avith white hairy 
tufts of mildew ; in another, a litter of half-putrid 
bones, mingled with pieces of old ochre-stained 
iron and nails ; and along one side of the room 
was ranged the mere skeleton of a bedstead, cov- 
ered witli a sack stufled with straw by way of 
mattress, and one solitary blanket that was as 
thin, and almost as black as coffin-cloth. The only 
chair was like an old bass fisli-basket in its rushy 
raggedness, and a huge sea-chest stood in the mid- 
dle of tlie room to do duty for a table, while the 
whole place reeked with the same damp, musty, 
fungusy odor as a ruin. 

The old miser himself was as spare and trem- 
ulous as a mendicant Lascar, and he had the same 
wretched, craven, crouching, grinning, nipped-up 
air with him too. His black and restless little 
eyes, with their shaggy, overhanging brows, gave 
him the sharp, irritable expression of a terrier, 
and there was a continual nervousness in his man- 
ner, like one haunted by a spectre. He wore a 
long duffle coat that had once been gray, but was 
now almost as motley as a patchwork counter- 
pane, from the many-colored pieces with which 
it had been mended ; and on either cuff of this 
there was stuck row after row of pins, that he 
picked up in his rounds, as close as the wires to 
a sieve. 

As the uncle and nephew entered the apart- 
ment, the miser retreated hurriedly from the door- 
way; and then, scrambling toward the bedstead, 
seated himself on the edge of it, with his arms 



PLEASUBE-HUNTING. 189 

Stretched out, so as to prevent either of his visit- 
ors corning there. 

" Well, you see, Master Jerry, I've brought a 
fagot of firewood with me this time," said the 
elder Benjamin, as he telegraphed to his nephew 
to deposit the bundle of sticks he had been carry- 
ing down by the fireplace. " I'm not going to sit 
shivering again in your draughty room, wdth the 
roof and the windows all leaking rheumatisms, 
catarrhs, and agues, as they do, without a handful 
of fire in the grate, I can tell you." And, so say- 
ing, he proceeded at once to turn up the collar 
of his coat, and to pantomime to his ne2:)hew to 
undo the fagot, and get a fire lighted as quickly 
as possible. 

The little fellow, however, was too much taken 
up with the strangeness of the place, and the 
quaint figure and odd ways of the queer old man 
seated on the bedstead before him, to make much 
haste about the matter ; so, as he knelt down to 
do his uncle's bidding, he kept fumbling at the 
withy band round the fagot, with his eyes now 
riveted upon the miser, and now fastened on the 
mounds of refuse stored in the difierent corners 
of the wretched-looking chamber. 

" How you can manage to live in such a place 
as this, Jerry, is more than I can make out," con- 
tinued Uncle Benjamin. 

" Well, you know. Master Franklin," respond- 
ed the old hunks, in a whining tone, and grinning 
sycophantically as he spoke, "rents are uncom- 
mon dear, and I can't afford to pay any more 
than I do here. A quarter of a dollar a week for 
a mere place to put one's old head in is a great 
deal of money, ain't it, now ?" 

" Can't afford, man alive ! why, you could afford 
to rent a mansion if you pleased," was the scorn- 
ful reply. 



190 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" How you do talk, Friend Franklin, to be sure ! 
You always seem to think I'm made of money, 
that you do," returned the miser, with a faint 
chuckle, as he pretended to treat the notion of 
his wealth as a mere joke. "Hah! if I'd only 
listened to such as you, I should have been in 
the poor-house long before this — he ! he ! he !" he 
added, with another titter. 

"And if you had been, Jerry, you would have 
been both better housed and fed there than you 
are here," the elder Benjamin made answer. 

" Ye-e-es ! I dare say I should ; a great deal, 
and for nothing too," grinned the old man, as he 
gloated for a moment over the idea of the gratu- 
itous board and lodging ; the next minute, how- 
ever, he added, with a sorrowful shake of the 
head, " But they wouldn't admit me into the 
poor-house, you see, because they know I've al- 
ways had the fear of dying of hunger in my old 
age before my eyes, and managed to save up just 
a dollar or two against it. No, no, it is only the 
prodigals and the unthrifts they'll consent to 
keep there for nothing ; and a pretty lesson that 
is to preach to the world, ain't it, now, Master 
Franklin ?" 

" Well, but, Jerry, Jerry," expostulated Uncle 
Benjamin, anxious to bring the miser to some- 
thing like common sense, " what on earth is the 
use of your having saved uj) this dollar or two, as 
you call it, against that eternal bugbear of yours 
— 'dying of hunger in your old age,' if you con- 
tinue to starve yourself, as you are doing now, 
day after day ?" 

"Ha! ha! ha!" laughed Master Jerry, in re- 
turn, and with as little unction in the laughter as 
though he had been a hyena rather than a man ; 
" and you'd have me spend all my hard-earned 
savings in eating and drinking, I suppose. Ha ! 



PLEASUEE-HUNTING. 191 

ha ! and a deal the better I should be for that, 
when my money was all gone, and I left without 
a penny in my old age ! No, no, Friend Frank- 
lin ; so long as I've got a dollar or two by me, I 
know no harm can come to me ;" and the gaffer 
chafed his weazened hands together as he chuck- 
led over his fancied security. 

"Madman!" muttered the elder Benjamin, 
aside; "and yet you suffer continually in the 
present the very harm you dread in the future." 

" Do you know. Friend Franklin," the miser 
went on, " what is the only delight I have left in 
the world now ? (I don't mind telling you as 
much, for you won't let any one know I've got a 
few dollars by me here, will you ?) why, it's to 
sit and look at the few pieces I've managed to 
save — though they are but a very few, I give 
you my word — for it's only when I've got them 
spread out before my eyes, and keep biting 'em 
one after another between my old teeth, to con- 
vince myself that there ain't a bad coin among 
'em, that I feel in any way sure that I sha'n't die a 
beggar after all. Ye-e-es, Friend Franklin, that's 
the only ha23piness I have in life now ; but you 
won't tell any body that I let you know I'd got a 
fqw dollars by me here, will you now ?" the miser 
added, abruptly, in a carneying tone, as a misgiv- 
ing stole over him concerning the imprudence of 
the confession he had made. " Oh ye-e-es, Friend 
Franklin, I'm sure I can trust to you, and" — said 
he, with a cunning whisper, as he pointed toward 
little Ben — " and the boy yonder too, eh — eh ?" 

The latter part of the speech drew Uncle Ben- 
jamin's attention once more to his nephew, and 
the progress he was making with the fire ; so he 
called out, as a cold shudder crept over his frame, 
" Come, I say, Master Ben, look alive and get the 
logs lighted" (for the boy had been attending 



192 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

more to the conversation than the grate) ; " I de- 
clare there's a draught here almost as strong as 
the blast to a furnace ;" and, so saymg, he set to 
work stamping his feet and chafing his palms, to 
stir the blood in them. Then, drawing his hand- 
kerchief from his pocket, he proceeded to tie it 
over his ears. 

The quick eye of the miser noticed something 
fall upon the floor as his visitor pulled his ker- 
chief from the hind part of his coat ; so, springing 
from the bedstead, he began groping on the 
ground for the article the other had dropped. 

" Oh ! it's only a piece of string, after all !" the 
old fellow cried, as he rose up on his feet again 
with a violent eftbrt. " But perhaps it's of no use 
to you. Friend Franklin," he added, with a true 
beggar's air; "and if so, I'll just take care of it 
myself, for I can't bear to see any thing wasted ; 
besides, it will come in handy for something some 
day." Whereupon, without waiting for the other 
to tell him he was welcome to the twine, the old 
niggard proceeded to wind it into a figure of 8 
on his finger and thumb, and ultimately to thrust 
it into the wallet-like pocket of his coat. 

As the miser sat at the edge of the bed, thus 
engaged for a while, he said, after a slight pause, 
" You haven't run across that minx, my Mary, of 
late, have you. Friend Franklin? — the heartless 
hussy, curse her!" And as he spat out the last 
words from between his teeth, there was a savage 
fury in the tone which it made young Benjamin 
almost shudder to hear. 

" Come, I say ! I say ! remember, the girl is 
your own flesh and blood, man," cried the elder 
Benjamin, reprovingly. 

" I do ; and therefore I say again. Curse her ! 
curse the jade forever and ever !" and the bitter- 
hearted old graybeard ground out his anathemas 



PLEASUEE-HUXTIXG. 193 

with a double vindictiveness. "Didn't she go 
away with that fellow she's married to, and leave 
her old father here alone, and almost helpless, 
without a soul in the world to attend upon him, 
or do a thing for him in his eleventh hour ? — no, 
not unless they're well paid for it, they won't, 
the mercenary wretches ! I told her to choose 
between me and the beggar she took up with, and 
she preferred the beggar to her old father ; so she 
may starve and rot with the beggar for what I 
care, for not so much as one stiver of mine does 
she or hers ever touch. No," he added, with all 
the intensity of a miser's lust and uncharitable- 
ness, " not if I have my money soldered down in 
my coffin, and take it into my grave with me," 
said he, as he ground his fangs and clenched his 
bony fists. 

This was more than Uncle Benjamin could 
bear ; so, starting from his seat, he turned sharply 
round upon the old hunks as he cried, in the fury 
of his indignation, " Your grave, man ! Do you 
think you can take your beastly gold and silver 
to hell with you ?" adding, half aside, " for they 
won't have it in heaven, I can tell you." 

" Well, well, I dare say not," answered the 
miser, as he shook his head backward and for- 
ward, and half cried over the ugliness of the re- 
proof; "though what's to become of it all, and 
who's to get it and squander it, after the trouble 
I've had to save it, costs me many an anxious 
thought ; so sometimes I think that it will be bet- 
ter in the end, perhaps, to have it buried along 
with me, and so have done with it altogether. 
Still, come what may, Mary shall never finger so 
much as a copper-piece of mine, I'll take care." 

There was a pause in the conversation for a 
minute or two, and then Jerry said, in a widely 
different tone, " You wouldn't believe it, Friend 
N 



194 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Franklin, but the other day the minx sent me a 
jug of soup. She thinks to get round me in that 
way, the artful bit of goods ; but she'll find her- 
self sorely mistaken, he ! he ! he ! I knew she 
sent it," he went on, "because the cloth it was 
tied up in was marked with her married name. 
When I found out who it had come from, do you 
know I was going to chuck it out of window ? 
but then, you see, I can't bear any thing to be 
wasted, so I put it in my cupboard there, and 
there it'll bide. Friend Franklin, till I'm dead and 
gone, I can tell you." 

By this time young Benjamin had laid the logs 
in the grate ; and having taken from his pocket 
the tinder-box and matches with which his god- 
father had provided him (for Uncle Benjamin 
knew well enough it would be idle to look for 
such things in the miser's room), he was begin- 
ning to chip away with the flint and steel as he 
knelt in front of the grate. 

No sooner, however, did the sound of the re- 
peated clickmg smite the miser's ear, than he 
darted from the bedstead, as if some sudden ter- 
ror had seized upon his soul; and, rushing to- 
ward the lad, laid hold of him by the collar, and 
nearly throttled the boy, just as he was in the act 
of blowing, with his cheeks pufled out as round 
as a football, at a stray spark that had fallen on 
the tinder. 

"What are you going to do? what are you 
going to do, boy?" the old miser shrieked, while 
he trembled from head to foot as if palsy-strick- 
en. " You can't light a fire there ; you'll set the 
chimney in a blaze." 

" Haugh ! haugh ! haugh !" roared Uncle Ben- 
jamin, derisively. " Set your chimney in a blaze, 
Jerry ! Why, it has never had a fire in it since 
I've known you. There, go along with you, man ; 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 195 

there's no fear of your having to pay for the en- 
gines : the flue's as free of soot as a master sweep 
on a Sunday, I'll swear. Besides, I'm frozen, 
Jerry — chilled to the very marrow, and must 
have just a handful of hot embers in the grate to 
warm me — at least, that is, if I'm to sit here any 
longer, and tell you any thing about your Mary ; 
for while you were raving and cursing just now, 
I hadn't an opportunity of edging in a word about 
the girl, remember." 

" Well, I dare say ! I dare say !" whined out 
the old miser, divided between the fear of fire 
and his curiosity as to the " circumstances" of his 
runaway daughter. "But you'll 2:)romise not to 
make much of a flame, w^on't you, now, good lad ? 
Besides," he added, " I can't bear to see wood 
burnt extravagantly ; and you don't know how 
close and hot this room does become with even 
the least bit of fire." 

" No, nor do you know much about that either, 
Jerry, I'm thinking," giggled Uncle Benjamin. 
"There, go back to your seat, man, and listen 
quietly to what I've got to say about your child. 
Come, you shall have all the w^ood that's left ; 
and, bless me ! we sha'n't burn a penn'orth of it 
altogether." 

The niggard suffered himself to be led back to 
the bedstead by his visitor, while young Ben, who 
had now lighted the smaller twigs, remained kneel- 
ing in front of the grate, blowing away at the 
burning branches in order to kindle the mass, 

" Well, you know, Jerry," proceeded the uncle, 
"I saw your Mary at the Conventicle last Sab- 
bath morning — " 

"Did you? did you?" cried the old fellow; 
" and what did she say ? Is she sorry for her 
disobedience ? Does the jade repent, and want 
to come back again to me — eh — eli ?" 



196 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

There was no time for Uncle Benjamin to an- 
swer the questions, for a loud cry from the boy at 
the fire made the pair of them start to their feet 
in an instant. 

The dry twigs, with which the grate had been 
nearly filled, had, with young Ben's continued 
pufling, become ignited all at once, and as the 
long tongue of tiame licked into the narrow 
mouth of the flue, the little fellow looked up the 
chimney, and fan(?ied he could see something 
a-light there ; so the next minute he cried aloud, 
" The chimney's a-fire, I'm sure. I can see some- 
thing burning in it." 

" Something burning in the chimney ! — what ! 
— what !" roared the distracted miser, as he tore 
his gray locks, and gesticulated as wildly as a 
maniac. 

The boy, who was still on his knees, with his 
head twisted on one side, as he watched the 
smouldering mass up the flue, seized one of the 
largest logs that he had placed against the wall, 
and thrust it far up the chimney, so as to rake 
down the ignited mass. 

" What would you do, boy ? what would you 
do ? It's my bag — my bag of money that's burn- 
ing there, I tell you !" and no sooner had the miser 
roared out the words, than a golden shower of 
guineas poured down the mouth of the chimney, 
and fell in a heap into the very midst of the blaz- 
ing logs and embers. 

The miser was fairly crazed as he saw his treas- 
ure descend, in a cataract as it were, into the very 
heart of the fire ; and, in the phrensy of the mo- 
ment, he thrust his bony hands into the midst of 
the burning wood, and dragged the heated coins, 
handful by handful, from out the flames ; till, 
writhing with the agony of his burnt palms, he 
was forced i fling the pieces down on the floor ; 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 197 

and there they rolled about, some falling between 
the chinks of the planks, and others strewing the 
boards so thickly that the wretched, squalid lit- 
tle garret seemed at last to be paved with gold. 

Then the old hunks fell upon his knees, and 
scrambled after the coins, crying like a child the 
while ; but presently, roused by a sudden fury, he 
sprang wildly to his feet again, and seizing one 
of the flaring brands he had just thrown under 
the grate, screamed as he whirled it madly in the 
air, " Begone, robbers ! thieves ! begone with you ! 
It was Mary that sent you here to do this ; she 
told you w^here my money was hid. Curses on 
you all ! begone, begone, I say !" 

It was no time to parley with the frantic man ; 
so Uncle Benjamin pushed his nephew out of the 
miser's reach, and then, as he thrust the boy into 
the passage, closed the door before the maniac 
had time to harm either little Ben or himself. 

And as the couple descended the creaking 
stairs, they could hear the old niggard in his 
phrensy, raving and sobbing, while he barred and 
bolted his garret door ; and then, counting the 
pieces, as he collected the remains of his treasure, 
crying, " One, two — curse the girl ! — three, four, 
five — curse her and hers, forever and ever !" 

Rational Animal No. 5. 

" What is money to me, my friend ?" exclaim- 
ed the inmate of the next garret they visited, aft- 
er Uncle Benjamin had narrated to the young 
man they found alone with his books there the 
scene that had just occurred at the lodgings of 
old Jerry the miser. 

" I care not to hive any of this human honey, 
Master Franklin, for it is honey that the golden- 
bellied wasps of the world distill only from weeds 
and tares. The sweet yellow stuff may be tooth- 



198 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

some to man in his second childhoocl, but to me 
there is a sickliness about it that clogs and dead- 
ens the finer tastes and natural cravings of man- 
kind." 

Young Ben gazed in all the muteness of deep 
wonder at the speaker. Every thing around him 
— the dingy and cheerless attic — the cold, empty 
grate — the scanty bedding — the spare and crazy 
furniture — the lean cupboard, with its solitary 
milk-can and crust of bread — all told the boy, 
even inexpert as he was at deciphering the sun- 
dry little conventional signs as to a person's " cir- 
cumstances" in life, that the poor garreteer had 
no more of the world's comforts to console him 
than either the drunkard or the miser. 

And yet the poverty seemed to invest the man 
with all the moral dignity of a hermit, whereas it 
had appeared to steep the others in all the squa- 
lor of habitual mendicancy. How different, too, 
was he in look and tone from either of those they 
had previously visited ! There was a gentleness 
and a music in his voice, as if his very heart- 
strings vibrated as he spake, and a high-natured 
expression in his features, that lighted up his 
blanched countenance like sunshine upon snow. 
His forehead was fair, and round as an ivory 
dome ; and his full liquid eyes were intensely 
blue, and deep as the sea far away from land ; 
while, as he talked of the world's vanities and 
glories, there was the same passionate play of 
nostril, and the same proud Avorking of the neck 
as marks a blood-horse's sense of his own ^^ower 
when pawing the ground at his feet. 

" But the long-eared Midases of the world. Mas- 
ter Franklin," the poet continued, " they who re- 
joice in the power of transmuting all they touch 
into gold, must be ever deaf to the grand har- 
monies of life and nature, ay, and blind as corpses 



PLEASTJEE-HUKTING. 199 

too — ^having their eyes forever closed with pieces 
of money — to the beauty which floods the earth 
with hght, color, and glory, as though it were the 
very halo of the Godhead shining over creation. 
Such as these affect to speak with pity of the poor 
poet ; but, prithee,, friend, who so poor in heart 
and soul as Dives himself? — as Dives, who can 
not taste a crumb of the ideal feast that is spread 
even for the mendicant Lazarus ? — Dives, in 
whose leathern ear the sea-shell sings not of the 
mighty mysteries of the ocean-deep, and to whom 
the little lark never warbles of the crimson grand- 
eur of the sky, the air, and earth, at break of day ? 
— Dives, in whose dull eyes the wild flowers show 
no grace, nor the tiny insects the least touch of 
art ? — ^Dives, the veriest pauper amid the richest 
of all riches — he of the stone heart and leaden 
brain ? Was Andrew Marvel poor, think you, 
when the libertine Charles sought to bribe him 
into silence ? Not he ; for he was richer than 
the king in honor and dignity — rich enough to 
be able to spurn the royal bribe, even though he 
was so poor in pocket as to be forced to borrow 
the means for a dinner the moment after." 

Little Ben had never heard such utterances be- 
fore ; and as he sat there, still staring intently at 
the speaker, he was marveling which w^as right — 
his uncle, who taught him that he must either 
save or be a slave, or this young man, whose very 
dignity and independence of spirit seemed to 
spring from his contempt for mere worldly wealth. 

The elder Benjamin could almost guess what 
was passing in his nephew's mind ; nevertheless, 
it was neither the time nor the place to clear up 
the difiiculty, so he remained as silent as the lad 
himself, and merely nodded his approbation as the 
poet conti§iued. 

" Nor -would I have the world's wealth, friend. 



200 YOU^'G BEXJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

at the world's price," the young man ran on. 
" What if the stomach icill sometimes crave for 
food, at least I have an ethereal banquet here in 
my little stock of books" — pointing to the few 
shelves slung against the wall — " a banquet that 
the gods themselves might revel in ; ay, and a 
banquet, too, that the pampered belly has seldom 
any zest for. These are the men. Master Frank- 
lin," he cried, his eyes glowing with the fervor 
of his soul as he turned to his favorite authors, 
" who are the blessed comforters of the poor, if 
the poor but knew them as poor I do ; these the 
worthies that care^not hoAV humble the dwelling 
they enter ; these the true hearts that have a 
good and kind word to whisper in every ear. As 
Francis Bacon says, they are the 'interpreters' 
between God and us — the ' interpreters' of that 
subtle myth which makes the soul of man a mere 
grub here and a butterfly hereafter ; the great 
translators of the miglity poem of creation — each 
rendering, as did the Septuagint of old, some 
special canticle or glorious passage in the Book, 
and each catching the sense and spirit of the 
great Original as if by inspiration. Can a man 
be poor, friend," he asked proudly, " when he 
can find any amount of treasure in these volumes 
merely by digging a little beneath the surface for 
it? Have I no jewels, when in this casket there 
are gems brighter and more precious than ever 
adorned a monarch's brow ? Have I no posses- 
sions, when such an inheritance as this has been 
bequeathed to me ? — no grounds, when I have 
these interminable gardens and academic groves 
about me to wander in as I list — gardens that are 
l^lanted with exquisite taste, and filled with all 
the flowers of the Elysian fields of innnortality — 
flowers that bloom forever in the b^oni after 
they are plucked, and whose perfume blends with 



PLEASUKE-HUNTIXG. 201 

the soul, till the mind itself becomes sweetened 
with their grace ?" 

The boy was entranced as he listened. lie had 
never before heard words uttered with such ar- 
dor ; they came ringing in his ear, and stirred his 
soul like a trumpet. The only zeal he had ever 
seen displayed as yet had been among the fanatics 
of the conventicle to which his father belonged ; 
but here was a man speaking with all the fervor 
of the most devout religion upon the grandeur 
and glory of mere poetry ; a man loving poverty 
with all the enthusiasm of an ascetic — not from 
any superstitious delight in the daily martyrdom 
of the tlesh, but because his taste found more re- 
fined joy in the sublimities of nature and thought 
than in the sickly sweetmeats of the world ; a 
man worshiping the divine element of beauty and 
truth in all things, and loathing the world's vani- 
ties and sensualities as the great uglinesses of 
life. It was impossible not to have faith in him. 
His creed was manifestly not a mere afiected sen- 
timent, but an all-absorbing passion — a passion 
that flashed like lightning in his eyes, and stirred 
his limbs like branches tossed by a hurricane. 

" How different," presently he continued, talk- 
ing half to himself till he became fired again with 
his subject, "does the possession of such wealth as 
this make us from what the world's wealth does ! 
Your money-riches are sure, sooner or later, to 
transform the heart into a mere iron chest — a 
coffer that no human key can open. They breed 
only lust and greed, as the muck-heap hatches 
vipers, and case the soul in an impenetrable armor 
of selfishness, whereas the treasures of the mind 
are as generous as wine to the spirit, unlocking 
the heart and the whole nature. Did these noble 
fellows," he cried, as he seized the volumes that 
lay on the table before him, and hugged them 



202 TOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

fondly to his bosom, " play the misers with their 
precious possessions?" Did these lords of Wis- 
dom's broad manor fence in their estate, and keep 
the ever-green fields of their fancy and philosophy 
to themselves ? or did they give them as a park 
to all the world, for even the poorest to ramble 
and sport in ? Yes, they shared their gifts and 
gems freely with such as me, and so made poor 
me almost as rich as themselves. And what would 
I do now ? why, I'd fall upon my very knees to 
you, if I could but get you and this lad here to 
share this same wealth with me in return — only 
to make you feel the same foretaste of heaven as 
I do when communing with these great souls, 
sj^irit to spirit, and giving back love for love." 

Then he paused for a moment ; and suddenly 
tossing his head till his long hair shook. like a 
lion's mane, he scowled at some imaginary social 
jackanapes as he asked indignantly, " Who dares 
taunt me with lack of fortune or want of fine 
friends, when I have Will Shakspeare here day 
after day by my side, humming the sweet music 
of his sonnets in my ear ? Why, if I knew all the 
high and mighty carriage-folk of the town, could 
it be half as grand to ride out with them as it is 
to travel with the spirit of John Milton into the 
very heavens themselves, and hear the blind old 
poet pour forth his wondrous pa3an on the light ? 
Can such as I feel it a privation to be denied the 
fellowship of empty-headed lords and dukes, when 
here, in my garret, I can have the best of all good 
company — the very pick of the noblest blood that 
ever flowed in human veins ? Am I sad ? then 
can I not have Butler here to make me laugh 
with the quaint wit and odd logic of his Hudi- 
bras ? If the hours hang heavy with me, are not 
Herrick, Carew, and Suckling ready to sing to 
me ? Do I want to learn how the world wags ? 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 203 

why Massinger, and Forcl, and Webster, and Beau- 
mont and Fletcher, ay, and Shakspeare himself, 
will come at my beck to show me how the pup- 
l^ets are moved by every passion, and to lay open 
my own and every other heart before my eyes, as 
if poor human nature was but a piece of clever 
clock-work. Or, if I long to travel, is there not 
brave Raleigh waiting to take me with him round 
the world ? Or, if my mood be more sedate, can 
I not invite old Burton here to charm me with 
his wonderful lore of melancholy ? ay, and even, 
if I please, get Newton, or Bacon, or Hobbes to 
talk philosophy with me, and lay bare the subtle 
mechanism of the universe itself? Ah! my 
friend," he added, as his face beamed with all the 
refined pride of his heart, " this is the royal pre- 
rogative of intellect — the blessed privilege that 
comes from a devout love of books. It can make 
the poorest among us richer than the richest; 
grant luxuries to those in want that even the 
beef-witted Crcesus himself could not purchase ; 
and give the most luckless in the world the right 
of fellowship with the most gifted and most illus- 
trious of mankind." 

Rational Animal No. 6. 
Again the scene shifted, and the lad and his 
uncle were away in the suburbs of the town, at 
the shooting and hunting "box" of one who 
thought " sport" to be the great charm of life. 
Here, as they entered, a kennel of fox-hounds 
made the woods ring with their cries, and dogs 
of every breed met them at every turn. There 
were spare and high-haunched greyhounds, ready 
coupled for coursing; gentle-looking and docile 
pointers and setters, with their eyes ever fixed , 
on their master; and shock-coated water-dogs, 
and wiry little rat-dogs, with their teeth gUsten- 



204 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

ing like gintraps, as they snarled at the new-com- 
ers ; and ugly-looking bandy-legged bull-dogs, too, 
with mouths and jowls like prize-fighters. In one 
of the out-houses was a long-backed ferret, with 
hair as white and eyes as pink as an albino, ready 
for the next day's sjDort at the rabbit-warren. In 
another there were globular wire cages full of 
brown rats, restless as a knot of worms, that had 
been traj^ped to settle some important wager as 
to how many of the vermin little " Wasp," with 
the gintrap-like teeth, could kill within the hour. 

The stables were filled with as many different 
kinds of horses as the yards swarmed with differ- 
ent breeds of dogs. Here was the satin-coated 
hunter, with limbs almost as slender as those of 
the greyhounds ; the sturdy little shooting-pony, 
whose legs seemed as short and thick as those of 
a four-jjost bedstead ; and the fast-trotting cob, 
that had done its fifteen miles within the hour, 
and won no end of money in its time. 

The interior of the house, too, was as typical 
of the tastes of the owner as the out-buildings 
themselves. The little hall bristled with antlers 
and buffalo horns jutting from the walls, and from 
the hat-j^egs hung huge jack fishing-boots and 
hunting-whips, while the rooms within were liter- 
ally crowded with tokens of the " sporting charac- 
ter" they belonged to. The sides of the chamber 
into which they were shown were covered with 
prints of celebrated winners of races ; and paint- 
ings of favorite horses, Avith some favorite groom 
standing at their head; and representations of 
far-famed fast trotters, with a gentleman in a tall 
skeleton gig, with big misty wheels, in the act of 
scrambling through some prodigious feat of ve- 
locity. There were engravings, too, of sundry 
shirtless heroes, in knee-breeches and *' ankle- 
jacks," with muscles as big as cannon balls UU' 



PLEASUKE-HUNTIIs^G. 205 

der the skin, striking an attitude of self-defense ; 
and memorials of some illustrious encounter be- 
tween two cliestnuty and fiery-faced game-cocks, 
as close cropped as felons, and with spurs as long 
as cobblers' awls fitted to their legs. Then there 
were colored sets of pictures representative of 
"going to cover," "breaking cover," in "full cry," 
and " in at the death," with others of " partridge 
shooting," and " wild-duck shooting," and bits of 
" still life," together -with a huge illustration of 
some extraordinary leaj) at a "steeple chase," 
where a fcAV of the liorses and riders were floun- 
dering in the bi*ook, others flying through the 
air, and others scrambling with their steeds up 
the opposite bank. Moreover, there were glass 
cases filled with two or three stuffed partridges 
feeding among some imitation stubble, and an- 
other inclosing an enormous preserved pike, with 
his scales as highly varnished as a coach-panel. 
Upon the table lay foxes' brushes set in silver 
handles, and made into little whisks for dusting 
knick-knacks ; and foxes' heads mounted as snuff- 
boxes ; and stags' feet, with little silver hoofs, fit- 
ted to the blades of knives ; while high above the 
mantle-piece was stretched a huge wild swan, 
with wide-spread wings, that measured goodness 
knows how many feet from tip to tip, and which 
had been shot by the owner of the establishment 
in the winter of such and such a year. In the 
different corners of the room, too, stood the sev- 
eral implements of the sportsman's art : fishing- 
rods, and double-barreled guns, and powder- 
flasks, and leathern wallets covered with netting, 
and riding and driving whips, and dog-whistles, 
and spears for otter-hunting, and felt hats with 
the crowns wound round with all kinds of lines 
and flies, and brown leathern leggins, and shoot- 
ing-boots as heavy and clumsy-looking as navi- 



206 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

gators', ay, and boxing-gloves, basket-hilted sin- 
gle-sticks, targets, and cases of dueling pistols too. 
The sportsman himself was busy at his morning 
meal of bread and chine, with a tankard of foam- 
ing home-brewed ale by his side. The manner in 
Avhich he scrambled down the food, coupled with 
the scarlet coat and black velvet cap in Avhich he 
was costumed, told that he Avas in haste to join 
the hounds somewhere ; and as he munched away, 
he described to "his visitors, with his mouth full, 
what a glorious day he expected to have, as Squire 
So-and-so had recently bought a score of foxes, 
and turned them all loose on his estate, for really 
their subscription pack had pretty well cleared 
the country before that. Then he remembered 
some particular magnificent run they had had 
some seasons back, and gave the couple a vivid 
description of the chase as he filled his jDOcket- 
flask with brandy from the liqueur-case. Next, 
as he sat down to exchange his slippers for the 
highly-polished top-boots that stood beside the 
fireplace, he wanted to know whether the young 
squire there, alluding to little Ben, had ever been 
at a hunt, and told the lad, as he screwed his 
mouth up till his face looked like a knocker, and 
tugged away at the boot-hooks, that a good run 
was the finest thing in life, and that there was 
nothing like fox-hunting in the world. After that 
he fell to hastily admiring the boy's figure, ask- 
ing how old he was, and calling hhn a nice little 
light weight. Then he wanted to know whether 
he had ever been licked at school, and whether he 
had taken any lessons yet in sparring; and said 
he wished he could stop and piit the gloves on for 
a minute, and have a round or two with him. 
Presently he asked Uncle Ben whether he had 
heard of the match that he had coming ofif short- 
ly; he had staked a hundred pounds that he 



PLEASUEE-HUNTING. 20T 

would bring down nineteen pigeons out of twen- 
ty — and he was sure to win, for he had bagged 
thirty brace of birds in a few hours only a few 
days back, and, what was more, he could snuff a 
candle with his dueling pistols at twenty paces 
three times out of four. Then, as he bustled 
about the room (rummaging among the litter of 
fish-cans, bullet-moulds, boxing-gloves, and books 
of flies, now for his riding-gloves, and now for 
some particular pet whip that he wanted), he told 
the boy that if he would come over some day he'd 
give him a ride on the pony, and take him out 
for a day's coursing, and then he should see some 
prime sport, if he liked, when the dogs slipped 
their couples. Why, he had one of the finest 
greyhounds in the world, the sportsman said, and 
had refused a hundred guineas for her over and 
over again. But he only wished he could stop 
longer with them, he added, as he slipped his 
great-coat over his scarlet jacket, though he 
wouldn't miss the meet that day not to please his 
own father, that he wouldn't. So he shook them 
both heartily by the hand, and then hurrying to 
the door, leaped into the saddle on the hunter 
young Benjamin had noted in the stable but a 
few minutes before, and, digging his spurs into 
the flanks of the steed, dashed doAvn the road, 
waving his little nut-shell of a hunting-caj^ to 
young Ben as he turned round in his saddle, and, 
cracking his whip, shouted " Yoyicks ! Yup ! 
Yup ! Yoyicks !" to the delighted and astonished 
boy. 

Rational Animal No. 1. 

The next character they visited differed again 
from all they had seen before. 

It was neither " sport," nor poetry, nor gold, 
nor drink, nor yet flowers that delighted this one, 



208 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

but merely " antiquities," as they are called. A 
mere bit of old brick — a tile marked with the 
stamp of one of the Roman legions was sufficient 
to throw the old antiquary into an ecstasy of en- 
thusiasm. A "celt" — an axe with a rude flint 
head — had greater joy for him than the finest 
work of art in the world. His house was filled 
wdth cabinets and glass cases, in which were 
stored heaps of what a good housewife would 
have denominated " rubbish," but which, in the 
antiquary's eyes, were far more precious than 
gold. The old oak chairs here were so knubbly 
with their carvings that it was impossible to rest 
either the back or arms against them without 
their leaving a series of lumps and bumps on the 
flesh ; the spoons were all " apostle spoons," as 
they are called, and so knobby that they could not 
be held with any comfort ; the walls were hung 
with bits of tapestry that were as ragged as a beg- 
gar's smock ; the pictures, queer old things, with 
gilt backgrounds, and figures of saints as limj)- 
looking as your " lean and slippered j^antaloon ;" 
the china, too, was of the queerest shapes and 
patterns, while the ornaments consisted of small 
bits of tesselated pavement dug up from some 
ancient Roman station, and which seemed like 
fragments of petrified draught-boards; besides 
little green-crusted and worn bronze urns, and 
small Egyptian clay figures that had been found 
buried with mummies, together with cracked 
Etruscan vases, and noseless Grecian busts, and 
statues without arms, that had much the look of 
Greenwich pensioners "in the abstract." Then 
there were satin cases filled Avith coins that had 
no more impression left on them than a charity- 
boy's metal buttons ; copies of hieroglyphic in- 
scriptions, and models of the Parthenon and Co- 
losseum ; tiny copies of Cleopatra's Needle and 



PLEASUKE-HUNTING. 209 

Trajan's Column, and an infinity of odds and ends 
besides — all of which had cost no end of money, 
time, and patience to collect, as well as study and 
learning to comprehend, and which the queer little 
old gentleman (who was only too delighted to 
exhibit them to little Ben) frankly confessed, as 
he led the couple round the place, that he had 
nearly ruined himself in getting together, and he 
had serious thoughts, he said, of leaving it all to 
the nation after his death. 

Rational Animal No. 8. 

After this the lad was conducted to an invent- 
or's house, and here he found the rooms filled with 
curious models of machinery, and working-draw- 
ings and plans of the queerest-looking apparatus, 
while the doors and windows were fitted with 
the strangest contrivances by way of fastenings. 
Here were extraordinary kinds of j)umps, and nov- 
el arrangements of water-wheels, and ships with 
revolving sails, like wind-mills, and flying ma- 
chines, and velocipedes, and vessels to travel under 
the water or along the bottom of the sea, and 
boats to sail upon land, and plans for heating 
houses too by flues sunk into the earth to such a 
depth as always to insure an equable temperature 
without the cost of fire. Besides designs for per- 
petual motion, and projects for discovering the 
longitude, and new motive powers, and plans for 
obtaining an inexpensive and inexhaustible force 
by taking advantage of the magnetism of the earth. 

"This notion alone," said the sanguine schemer, 
as he pointed to some pet notion, " is worth twen- 
ty thousand guineas at least ;" then " that," he 
told them, " was a sure fortune to any one ;" 
while if another " only answered," it would be 
impossible for any one to estimate the amount of 
money it would reahze. 
O 



210 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Little Ben looked with inordinate wonder at 
the individual as he heard him speak of the im- 
mense value of his projects one after another, and 
marveled how, if he was the possessor of such ex- 
traordinary wealth, there should be so poverty- 
stricken an air about his dwelling. 

Xor was the boy's astonishment in any way 
decreased when he heard the man, as he stood 
on the door-steps assuring them that he wouldn't 
take a hundred thousand guineas, if any one 
would lay the money down on the stones before 
him, for even a half share in his flying machine, 
whisper immediately afterward in his uncle's ear, 
just before leaving, that he'd consider it a great 
favor if he would let him have half a dollar for a 
day or two. 

Rational Animal No. 9. 
From the inventor the couple wended their 
way to the chief astronomer of the town, and this 
man they found scarcely able to speak to them, 
for he was busy sweeping the heavens for a new 
planet, which, after years of laborious calculation, 
he had ascertained should exist somewhere be- 
tween the orbits of Jupiter and Saturn. He had 
been engaged in making observations upon this 
matter almost night and day, he said, for the last 
twelvemonth, and had laid out hundreds upon a 
new reflecting telescope, the speculum of which 
alone had cost more than half the money, for he 
was determined to make the discovery all his 
own. To him there was no pleasure but in watch- 
ing the stars — no use for money but in the pur- 
chase of equatorials, astronomical clocks, transit 
instruments, artificial horizons, mural circles, and 
micrometer glasses, etc., etc. 



pleasure-hunting. 211 

Rational Animal No. 10. 

The visit to the astronomer was followed by a 
peep into the household of an entomologist, where 
the boy found the study of the stars replaced by 
that of insects. 

It was no longer distant worlds, but the tiniest 
things on earth that absorbed the entire time and 
means of this individual. Here cases of spittedr 
butterflies and cockchafers delighted the big baby^ 
christened " philosopher." Here the telescope 
was laid aside for the microscopic, and the every- 
day world of human passion ignored for the hid- 
den one of animalcular life and habits. The inhab- 
itants of a drojD of water were, to the magnified 
vision of this particular sage, creatures of the live- 
liest interest, whereas those of the next street 
were hardly worth a moment's thought. To see 
the blood circulate in the web of a frog's foot, 
this worthy spent pounds and pounds upon an 
*' eighth," but to know how the heart of man was 
stirred he would not give a doit. What an ex- 
quisite charm there was to him in enlarging the 
dust of a butterfly's wing to the magnitude of an 
ostrich's feathers, or in looking at the proboscis 
of a blue-bottle under a " high power!" but how 
" stale, flat, and unprofitable" to bring even a "low 
power" to bear upon the parasites of society, or 
to scrutinize the economy of the human blood- 
sucker ! In a w^ord, to brother man not the slight- 
est heed, nor even a penny was given, whereas to 
brother tadpole an entire life and a small fortune 
were devoted. 

Even little Ben, as he was whirled, so to speak, 
from one house to another by his uncle, and in- 
troduced to the most opposite characters in rapid 
succession (for the old man strove to bring out 



212 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the "high Hghts" of the picture of human life in 
all the black and white of strong contrast), could 
hardly help philosophizing, in his own simple way, 
upon the puzzling problem that had been brought 
under his notice. 

"How strange!" mused the lad to himself, as 
he jogged along ; " one man finds no pleasure but 
in studying the stars, another no delight but in 
contemplating insects ; one in perpetually spying 
through magnifying glasses at little specks of 
light which are ' millions of miles away,' the oth- 
er forever looking through the same kind of glass- 
es at tiny creatures that are almost as far removed 
from himself! One declares there is no happi- 
ness in the world like that of sporting ; another 
vows the only true joy is to be found in books ; 
a third that it lies in show and dress. One sac- 
rifices every thing to get drink, another to get 
money ; this one to collect Aveeds and wild-flow- 
ers, and that man to collect bits of old pavement, 
old tiles, and vases. How odd it is ! and one and 
all, too, are ready to give up their lives and for- 
tunes to their particular pursuit." 

The view of hfe seemed as inconsistent to the 
little fellow as the jumble of scenes in a dream. 

"Ha! my man," smiled Uncle Benjamin, de- 
lighted to listen to the boy's reflections, " I dare 
say the riddle of human nature does puzzle you a 
good bit ; and, to tell the truth, it occasionally 
puts me to my wit's end to comj^rehend it, even 
old stager as I am, and up to most of the antics 
of the mummers too. To run the round of one's 
acquaintances in this way, lad, and see the differ- 
ent characters one meets with in his journeys 
from house to house, is to my mind very much 
like going over a large lunatic asylum, and learn- 
ing, as you pass from cell to cell, the various queer 
manias with which the several inmates are pos- 
sessed." 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 213 

But there was no time just then to reason on 
the matter: the first object was to see and ob- 
serve ; to draw conckisions was an after consider- 
ation. So on the old man and boy hurried to in- 
spect some more of the shows in the great "Van- 
ity Fair." 

" Walk up ! walk up !" cried Uncle Ben to the 
lad as they approached the next human curiosity, 
" and see now the most celebrated epicure in all 
the town." 

Rational Animal No. 11. 

They met the worthy, hobbling along with a 
punnet of tomatoes in his hand (with one ele- 
phantine foot done up in flannel, and incased in a 
huge list slipper), on his way to the fishmonger's 
at the end of the street where he lived ; and 
there, as he stood picking out a prime bit of sal- 
mon — "just a pound or two from the thick part 
of the fish" — he told them how he had been suf- 
fering from his " old friend the gout," though he 
was happy to say his dyspepsia was a leetle bet- 
ter, for he had been dieting himself a good bit of 
late. He had cut ofi" his " night-cap" of Maras- 
chino punch after supper, he said, for he had 
found out at last that that had been doing him a 
deal of harm, though it was delicious tipple, to be 
sure. Then he had given up his toast and caviar 
in the middle of the day ; for his medical man had 
told him caviar was too rich for him, and that 
really his stomach was so weak that he must be 
most careful about what he ate — most careful. 

" You see, Franklin," continued the gourmand, 
as he jerked at his acre of waistcoat, that was 
dappled with gravy-spots all down the front, and 
tried to force it over the huge wen of a stomach 
that bulged out like the distended crop of an 
enormous pouter pigeon, " you see, Franklin, I 



214 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

make flesh so fast that, do what I will, I can't 
prevent myself running into corj^ulency. Why, 
I've even reduced my quantum of Madeira, I give 
you my word, to half a pint per diem ; and if 
there's one thing I like more than another," he 
added, by way of parenthesis, " it certainly is a 
glass of good Madeira ; but it must be good, you 
know, Franklin — good, or it's apt to turn acid 
with me ; for my medical man assures me all fer- 
mented liquors make fat. But, though I go on 
with my dinner-pills (and my doctor, I must say, 
has given me one of the best pills of that kind I 
ever met with), and take more exercise than I 
used, still, the deuce is in it, I can't keej) the bulk 
down — ccoiH keep it under, Franklin, anyhow;" 
and again the worthy gave another twitch at the 
waistcoat, that ivould keep rucking u]) over the 
rolls of his abdomen. 

Then, having at length settled about the fish, 
he slii^ped one arm into that of the elder Benjamin, 
and resting the hand of the other on the shoulder 
of the younger one (for he had given the boy the 
little basket of love-apples to carry), he began 
hobbling back to his house between the two, 
stopping every now and then to writhe with the 
agony of some passing twinge. 

" W/ii/ I should be plagued with this infernal 
gout as I am," he exclaimed, as he stood still in 
the street, and screwed his face up till it assumed 
the expression of a compressed gutta-percha head, 
"I'm sure I can't tell. My doctor says it's all 
stomach ; and heaven knows no man can be more 
particular about his feeding than I am. Indeed, 
I never could bear coarse food, Franklin — 7iever. 
I think every one of my friends will allow that. 
But the misfortune is, you see, I have such deli- 
cate nerves, though few persons would think it, 
perhaps, in a man of my build ; but I can assure 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 215 

you my belief is that '; lerves — nerves — or I 
may say, indeed, a natiuL'J ^vant of stamina — that 
is at the bottom of all oiy sufferings. The least 
thing I take seems to disagree with me. Now 
what was my dinner yesterday: why, nothing 
could have been simpler in the world, Franklin — 
nothing. First I had just a little vermicelli soup, 
with a sprinklino- of grated Parmesan over it. 
By-the-by, Frankan," h« asked suddenly, as he 
stopped and lookv9d Uncle BonjamiiJ. fuJJ iu thQ 
face, " did you ever try the grated cheese with 
the vermicelli ? Well, do ! 1 give you my word 
it's a marvelous iraprovemerc — m-w-mar-velous ! 
Then there was a 11 tie ^vater-souci ; and you 
know there's notK ing ligher than water-souci in 
the world; but it's-, n a^i^rite dish of mine, Frank- 
lin, for, 'pon my hor , I think it's the most deli- 
cate flavor in life ; avi<l with this, of course, there 
was just a simple glass of Madeira to wash it 
down. Well, after that came a small dish of lamb 
choj^s, breaded, with sauce piquante, for you know 
I am quite alone, Franklin" (he added, parenthet- 
ically), " and can't indulge in heavy joints, even if 
my poor stomach would allow me ; or else, I must 
confess, I certainly should have preferred a kib- 
bob of mutton — did you ever eat a kibbob, Frank- 
lin ? Well, take my advice, and have one im-me- 
diately, and you'll live to bless me for the counsel ; 
and besides these things, there was just a couple 
of kidneys sauteed with Champagne, and a field- 
fare or two stuffed with juniper-berries, and served 
with juniper sauce — the latter a thing that my 
cook does divinely^ I can assure you — dee-vi7iely/ 
And then for sweets — though I'm not much of a 
sweet-eater, certainly — there was a — let me see, 
what did I have yesterday ?" and again he made 
them both stand still as he reflected — " cocoanut 
pudding, was it ? no, no ! that was the day when 



216 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Tom Skeffington dined with me, and he went into 
such raj^tm-es about the dish, and would make me 
give him the receipt for it. Oh yes, I know now; 
it was — " (and he screwed his face again into all 
the distortions of a gorgon's head as he interject- 
ed, " Hang the gout !) — it w^as — Avhat is such a 
special favorite of mine — a ci'nril.)eiTy tart, with a 
custard or two. You see, F^jtiklin, the custard 
takes off the roughness of the ranberry; and if 
it has just a dash of vanilla in it, by way of fla- 
voring, I give yoi' rny word it's most luscious — 
m.os.t 1--1 — lusciou"' J'' he repeated. *' You try it, 
Franklin ; now do^ j7St to obht^e me, for I'm sure 
you'll think it one of the grc'at< ;st treats in life. 

"Well, now, although that— -with just an olive 
or two, and a griddle- Jike to relish my wine, 
with a thimbleful of cherry-water as a digester to 
finish — constituted the whole of my yesterday's 
dinner," the epicure went on, " and I'm sure, as I 
said before, nothing could be simpler or lighter ; 
still, you'd hardly believe it, sir, but when I got 
up this morning my tongue was furred — quite 
furred^ I give you my honor ; and it wasn't un- 
til I had taken a glass of brandy and soda-water 
that I could touch the least bit of the delicious 
cold i^artridge pie I had got for breakfast." 

By this time they had reached the gourmand's 
house ; and as Uncle Benjamin was preparing to 
depart, the epicure held his hand firmly locked in 
his as he kept shaking it, while he said, " No, no, 
Franklin, I couldn't think of letting you go in 
this way. You really must come in now ; why, 
I thought you'd stop and take potluck with me 
to-day. I should make no stranger of you, you 
know. There's only that little bit of salmon you 
saw me buying (though it was a splendid fish, to 
be sure; and, with a little cucumber, I should 
think, would eat superbly — &\x-perhly!) and just a 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 21T 

wild duck, with a few little kickshaws, of course, 
besides ; and something or other by way of pastiy 
— such as some pine-apple beignets — to wind up 
with. Well, I can't offer you any thing better 
to-day. But I'll tell you what, Franklin, if you'll 
promise to honor me another time, and only let 
me know forty-eight hours beforehand, why, I'll 
have something recherche for you — truly ree- 
cherche, I will, indeed." 

But Uncle Benjamin only shook his head; 
whereupon the other added, " Oh, I don't mean 
to say I should put myself much out of the way 
for you ; but we will have just a nice little dinner, 
thaf^s all — one of the bachelor tete-a-tete affairs, 
that I believe I can manage as well as most peo- 
ple. Say, for instance, a few smelts and a canvas- 
back duck stewed with turnips. By-the-by, did 
you ever taste the canvas-backs that way ? They're 
simply delicious, I can assure you — dee-licioiis ! — 
especially if you insist upon the cook browning 
the turnips well before he stews them. Ay, and 
then, my boy," he cried, as he tapped the other 
on the shoulder, " you shall taste my new sauce. 
Dear me ! I quite forgot to tell I had invented a 
new sauce; how oblivious of me, to be sure! 
Well, you know, Franklin, I've been after the 
thing for years — indeed, for years and years^ I 
may say, but I never could get it to please me 
exactly somehow. However, at last, just one lit- 
tle condiment extra settled it; and now every 
body pronounces it to be — perfection ! simply 
per-r;/ection !" he shouted, and enforced the mer- 
its of the article with so vigorous a thump on 
Uncle Benjamin's collar-bone that the old gentle- 
man fairly staggered under the blow. " Oh, it's 
the most exquisite flavor in life, I give you my 
word. I'm going to call it," he ran on, *' '•Saiice 
d IcC — what's his name ? Lord bless me ! I shall 



218 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

forget my own name next. You know — I call it 
after the celebrated French cook of Louis the 
Fourteenth's time — the cook, you remember, who 
committed suicide because the fish, poor fellow ! 
didn't arrive till long after the hour the dinner 
was ordered for. Sad thing, wasn't it ? and you 
know they do say, Franklin, his bashawed lobster 
was a thing to eat and then die. But you'll come 
in and have just a glass of my Amontillado, with 
a teaspoonful of orange bitters in it — -just one, 
now — to give you an ai^petite for your dinner, 
man," he added, pulling at the arm of the uncle 
as he struggled to depart. " AYell, well, if you 
loill go, you must, I suppose ;" and then, as the 
epicure knocked at the door, he turned round and 
cried, "But, by-the-by, Franklin, would you mind, 
as you pass the corner of the next street, callmg 
in at the green-grocer's there for me — you know 
the nice store where they have always the win* 
dow stocked with such a superb show of the bet- 
ter kinds of fruits and vegetables, and telling 
them to send me a punnet of their very best sea- 
kale? Please to say it must be the very best, 
and that I've made up my mind I won't give 
more than half a dollar the basket for it; for 
that's quite enough money, I'm sure, at this time 
of year. I wouldn't troui>le you, Franklin, but 
really this gout," and he made another ugly face 
as he emphasized the words, " is the most excru- 
ciating torture, I can assure you — ex-x-c?'00-ciat- 
ing!" 

Rational Animal Xo. 12. 
Nor did the gallery of character portraits cease 
here. Uncle Ben was anxious that his little pupil 
should see every phase of human eccentricity of 
which he could muster a specimen among the 
circle of his acquaintance; so now he took the 



PLEASUEE-HUNTING. 219 

lad to some inveterate politician, and let him see 
how this man's thoughts and time were entirely 
absorbed in attending vestries, and denouncing 
the overseers of the parish as the " robbers of the 
poor," in opposing rates, influencing elections, in 
declaiming at public meetings, and holding forth 
to the fuddled frequenters of bar-parlors in the 
evening on the rascalities of all governments, the 
dishonesty of ministers, and the rights of man, as 
well as the iniquities of the taxes. 

RATiojiTAL Animal No. 13. 
Next he would lead the little fellow to some 
gentleman turner, who spent hundreds upon a 
lathe, his rose-engines, and eccentric chucks, and 
who passed his days in amateur carpentering and 
cabinet-making, with a French polished mahogany 
tool-chest, and the most elegant rosewood-han- 
dled chisels and gimlets ; turning now ivory cups, 
and balls, and chess-men, and now fanciful needle- 
cases, and thimbles, and tobacco-stopjDers for his 
friends, or else fashioning marquetry-work, or 
buhl work-tables, or mounting fire-screens for the 
more favored ladies of his acquaintance. 

Rational Animal No. 14. 
And after this the boy would be introduced to 
some experimental chemist, and find this strange 
specimen of humanity surrounded with retorts, 
alembics, stills, crucibles, and furnaces ; gasome- 
ters, theraiometers, and pyrometers ; together 
with specific-gravity scales and acetometers, ba- 
rometers, hygrometers, and eudiometers ; blow- 
pipes and test-tubes ; electrifying machines and 
magnets ; and, indeed, such an infinity of necro- 
mantic-looking apparatus, that made little Ben 
regard the proprietor of the laboratory more as 
sorcerer than sage. 



220 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Then here the youth would learn that the grand 
object of life and study was to separate some 
lump of earth, or bottle of liquid, or jar of air, 
into its elements, or to compound some new body 
out of the diiferent kinds of matter existing in 
the world. Here he was told that the pursuit 
of truth for truth's own sake was the noblest 
thing in life; that poetry was mere prettiness, 
and added nothing either to man's knowledge 
of the world in which he was placed, nor to his 
progress in it ; that there was a profound charm 
in lighting on a new discovery, or evolving some 
new fact or law in nature, which transcended all 
other forms of happiness ; that the study of the 
subtle forces of creation — the secret affinities of 
things — the strange sympathy of this bit of mat- 
ter with that, and its inexplicable antipathy to 
some other substance — the continued contempla- 
tion of those wondrous powers in the world, lying 
as they did at the very heart of the great mys- 
tery of nature and life, yielded a delight — the 
philosopher assured the boy — that at once satis- 
fied, enlightened, and elevated the mind. 

Rational Animal ISTo. 15. 

But scarcely had the words of the natural phi- 
losopher died in the little fellow's ear than he was 
in the studio of a young artist ; and him he found 
as enthusiastic about art and its glories as the 
philosopher had been about science, or the poet 
loud in his praises of poetry ; for the young paint- 
er spoke of the old masters with all the venera- 
tion of a zealot and the affection of a son. Now 
it was "magnificent old Michael Angelo;" then, 
" glorious old Rembrandt ;" and " dear old Ru- 
bens;" and "fine old Titian." He loved them, 
and worshiped them, every one, he said, with all 
the intensity of a woman's affection ; and when 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 221 

he had gone into raptures at the mere remem- 
brance of the special excellence of each, as the 
vision of their Avorks flitted one after another 
before his mind, he asked, " What is all art but 
the highest type of power in man, even as the 
Almighty himself is the Great Artist above all, 
because He is the All-powerful? Are not the 
works of God signal evidences of God's tran- 
scendent art? and is not this art the chief evi- 
dence we have of His transcendent power ? We, 
lad," he said to the boy, " are but the poor copiers 
of the one great work — the one grand tableau of 
creation, and he the Great Original ; we but the 
mere shufflers of the infinite varieties of form 
about us into new arrangements, and He the 
Great Inventor of all forms and figures ; we but 
the petty balancers of light and shade. He the 
great Creator of the clear and the obscure through- 
out the world. And while it costs us poor paint- 
ers inordinate pains and study to compound our 
colors and give luminousness to our works. He, 
by the mere craft of His will, illuminated His 
handiwork with infinite brightness in an instant, 
and made the lovely landscape of the new-born 
earth flash into a thousand difterent hues with 
but one touch of the wondrous pencils of light as 
they fell upon the woods, the fields, the mountain 
peaks, and the sky, for the first time of all. If, 
then," said the artist, " there be art in divinity, at 
least there must be some touch of divinity in art. 
" The Divine attributes," the painter went on, 
" are goodness, wisdom, and power, and the hu- 
man exponents of these qualities in the world are 
the clergyman, the philosopher, and the artist; 
but the artist transcends all. Art, for instance, 
must take precedence of science ; for what is all 
natural science but the explanation of God Al- 
mighty's art as seen in the works of creation, 



222 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

even as all criticism is but the expounding of hu- 
man art as displayed in the works of man's im- 
agination. Human wisdom comes from experi- 
ence, but art is intuitive, lying in the innate 2:>er- 
ception of the beautiful, and the inherent faculty 
to render it either pictorially, musically, or poet- 
ically. Again, without a sense of art there could 
be no worship) ; for the feeling of worship comes 
only from the admiration and the reverence that 
a sense of the mighty power manifested in all 
objects of creation naturally begets in the mind. 
There is indeed," he said, " a spontaneous wor- 
shij^fulness naturally uj^rising from the love and 
appreciation of art ; for who could be conscious 
of standing in the august presence of a power in- 
finitely superior to his^wn, without a feeling of 
veneration for the All-powerful overshadowing 
and humbling his soul ?" 

" Did not the zealous old painters pray" — he 
asked — " j^ray as few pray nowadays, before they 
dared to try and hobble after the great creative 
power? and who but a man accustomed to be 
continually thinking of the Artist in all the works 
he looks upon — to have an ever-abiding sense of 
the prompter, as it were, behind the scenes — could 
contemplate nature with half the reverence in his 
eye and mind that a true and high artist really 
does ? To such a one a glorious picture is not a 
mere piece of prettily-colored canvas, nor a no- 
ble statue only an elegant toy in stone. Xo !" 
the painter exclaimed, with all the enthusiasm of 
his ardent and reverent spirit ; " the exquisite 
counterpart of nature hanging against the wall is 
to the artistic sense radiant with all the glory of 
the counterpart of the divinity that created it, 
and the marble bust animate Avith all the fine in- 
telligence and power of the divine spirit that 
made the stony bosom heave with life. Even bo 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 223 

the world of beauty itself, which, to the blear eyes 
of the vulgar, the prosaic, and ascetic, is but a 
prettiness, or utility, or a vanity at best, appears 
to the artist, who is ever thinking of the Artist in 
all he sees and admires, as a gorgeous, colored, 
and jeweled veil, through which the unspeakable 
grandeur of the Godhead is everlastingly beam- 
ing with infinite love and grace upon mankind." 

Rational Animal No. 16. 
The musician, whom the boy saw soon after- 
ward, discoursed nearly to the same tune, though 
with some slight variation. To him there was a 
lovely melody forever flowing through all crea- 
tion ; the very succession of the seasons — the 
passage from night to day — the revolution of the 
planets — the rush of comets — the stately proces- 
sion of the clouds — the mighty surging of the 
tides — the pulsing of the human heart — all this 
was but the latent music of the world ; for to the 
finely-attuned ear and mind it suggested a corre- 
sponding rhythm of melodious and stirring sounds, 
that seemed like the distant hum of the great an- 
gelic choir heard in the soul, even as one hears the 
murmuring of the waves in the shell after it has 
been cast out of its ocean home. There was no 
joy, the musician told the youth, so pure, so en- 
trancing, so transporting as that of music. It fell 
like an ethereal dew upon the fevered spirit of 
man, and flowed like the softest and subtlest balm 
into the wounds of the bruised heart. It was the 
manna of the mind — a kind of honeyed rain from 
heaven, sent down to sustain us in the wilderness 
of life and trouble. " What would the voice of 
man be without its natural tones ?" the musician 
inquired. " Why, words," he answered, " were 
the mere black and white of speech ; it was tone 
and expression that gave its true color to Ian- 



224 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

guage. Was there not an innate and special 
rhythm to each particular feeling — a different 
key-note to almost every different passion in our 
souls ? Fear shrieked in discord, whereas love 
always lisped in music. Then the universal har- 
monies of things that philosophers and poets 
spoke so much about — what was this but the light 
melting into melody as it fell on Memnon's head ? 
All science was but the music of reason — the har- 
monizing of different passages from the great op- 
era which was forever being performed about us ; 
while all art was but the attempt of a few fiddlers 
to " render" the grand organ-peal of the universe 
— to give expression to some stray little bit of 
special beauty, that the spirit fancies it has caught 
up from the works of the Great Master. Every 
thing was music, music every thing." 

Little Ben was bewildered beyond utterance 
with what he heard. "Which was right?" he 
kept wondering ; " which was right ?" But, be- 
fore he could give vent to any thing beyond the 
crudest astonishment, the uncle had brought him 
to some fresh " rara avis" among men — some new 
version of life's whims and oddities. 

And when the boy had been taken to see trav- 
elers and jjhilologists ; tulip-fanciers, entomolo- 
gists, and meteorologists ; chess-players and phys'- 
iognomists (there were no phrenologists nor mes- 
merists in those days), old book collectors and stat- 
isticians, or mere fact and figure collectors ; ama- 
teur actors, amateur sailors, and amateur stage- 
coachmen as well — ay, and almost the whole army 
of your hobby-horse volunteers in existence, the 
tutor and his pupil at length returned home, fair- 
ly tired out with their excursions in quest of the 
pleasure-seekers of human life. 

" But, uncle," said little Ben, for the hundredth 



PLEASURE-HUNTING. 225 

time of asking, as they sat resting their outstretch- 
ed limbs in front of the wood fire in the little 
back parlor of the candle-store, " of all the queer 
people we have seen, and the many queer tastes 
and fancies we have found them indulging in, 
which do you really think now is right ?" 

" Well, lad," answered Uncle Ben, " I look upon 
them all, as I told you long ago, as a lot of big- 
boys chasing one and the same butterfly. If they 
were so many puppets, Ben, with a wire up their 
back-bone, and pulled by some invisible hand, 
they couldn't be made to play up greater antics, 
or be more assuredly set in motion by one and 
the same cause." 

"Yes, uncle, I know," rej^lied the impatient 
youngster ; " but you haven't answered my ques- 
tion. Now, which of all the many different pur- 
suits we have seen is, in your opinion, the most 
rational ?" 

" Hah ! my little man," returned Uncle Ben, 
with a philosophic sigh, " there are so many dif- 
ferent roads to happiness in this life, that, unless 
we have the ground we are to travel over clearly 
mapped out before our eyes, it is difficult to say 
off-hand which is the shortest cut, or even the 
cleanest or most agreeable way to it. Unfortu- 
nately, too, there is no sign-post set up at the 
point where the different cross-roads meet to di- 
rect us along the right path, or to say, 'This 

LEADS TO misery' 'THIS IS THE EOAD TO EUIN' 

— 'this is the nearest way to shame' — 'this 
IS THE HIGHWAY TO FOLLY,' and SO on ; so that 
when we come to this juncture in our journey 
through life, and stand deliberating as to which 
of the many turnings we had better take, why, we 
may be led by an infinity of circums4:ances to strike 
into the wrong path, and find out, when it is too 
late to retrace our steps, that what we fancied at 
P * 



226 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

starting to be a perfect palace in the distance, sur- 
rounded by the most extensive pleasure-grounds, 
is merely the poor-house, or the county jail, or 
some great lunatic asylum after all." 

" But, uncle," exclaimed the eager lad, determ- 
ined not to be put off, " you onicst have some 
opinion yourself on the matter. Which of all the 
persons we saw do you think, now, was going the 
right road, as you call it ?" 

"Which do 7" think — was going — the right 
road, lad ?" echoed the old man, with the most 
tantalizing tediousuess. " Is that what you want 
to know, Ben?" 

" Yes, uncle ; which do you say — which ?" the 
boy inquired again, as he leaned forward in his 
anxiety to catch the answer. 

" Well, then, let us see — let us see," was the 
sole rej^ly. 



CHAPTER XVII. 

THE RIGHT ROAD. 

'' Well, uncle," said little Benjamin, after a 
slight pause, " go on ; which is the right road, as 
you call it ?" 

"Ay, but wait a while, Ben, wait a while," said 
the other, as he knit his brows, and nibbled away 
at his thumb nail with all the vigor of a mouse at 
a cheese-paring, muttering to himself the while, 
" There's nothing like making an impression while 
the wax is warm." Then he suddenly looked up, 
half vacantly, at his nephew, and inquired, "What 
kind of a night is it, Ben ?" 

" Oh, quite fine and bright starlight, I declare," 
answered the boy, as he thrust his head between 
the curtains of the little back window. " But, 



THE RIGHT ROAD. 227 

l^ray, what has that got to do with the right road, 
iiDcle?" 

" Yes, nothing hke making an impression while 
the wax is Avarm," he mumbled again to him- 
self; and then asked aloud, "And which way's 
the wind, lad ?" 

" The wind, uncle !" echoed the youngster, more 
and more puzzled ; " why, it's as near as possible 
due south,"Jie called out, as he went again and 
peeped between the window-curtains. " I can 
see by the smoke yonder coming out of old Mr. 
Brownwell's chimney. But what are you up to, 
uncle, eh ?" 

" Southerly, is it !" was the reply ; " so much 
the better — so much the better, for then it's sure 
to be warm. Give me my hat and spencer, Ben- 
jamin," he said, starting suddenly from his chair. 

" Why, you're never going out at this hour ?" 
exclaimed the godson, in utter bewilderment. 

" There, never mind, lad, but do you go and get 
your top-coat, and come along with me," the god- 
father went on. " There's no possibility of go- 
ing over the matter here, with that shop-bell 
tinkling away every minute, and the people dodg- 
ing continually in and out," he kept mumbling 
half to himself, as he stood with his arms stretch- 
ed out behind him, waiting mechanically for the 
boy to slip the sleeves of his spencer over them. 
And then, as he turned round suddenly, and found 
his nephew had never stirred from the spot, but 
was still staring at him in wonder as to whether 
he could really be serious in what he was doing, 
he cried out, " Why, you young rascal, I'm not 
going to carry you off to the prairies again, never 
fear ! You're a bit tired, I dare say, Ben, but 
Ave're not going far ; so look alive, or we shall 
have your father putting up the shutters before 
we start." 



22S YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

Some half hour afterward the nncle and his 
nephew were seated on a solitary lump of rock 
that jutted just above the sands on the sea-shore, 
scarce a mile beyond the town of Boston. 

The night was almost as bright as day; and 
liad it not been for the silvery rays of the full 
moon, which seemed to cover the earth with a 
sheet of snow, one might have fancied, from the 
luminousness and transparency of the air, that it 
was the cold blue twilight of an earfy summer's 
morning. 

The sky was frosted all over with " star-dust," 
and sparkled like the sea at night in the tropics 
with its million points of lire. Down the centre 
of the firmament streamed the broad phosphores- 
cent band of the " Milky Way," with its " fire- 
mist" of stars, looking almost as fine and infinite 
to the naked eye as the minute particles that go 
to make up the bloom on a butterfly's wing, and 
seeming as though the curtains of the heavens 
were parted there, and one could just catch the 
dazzle of the countless multitude of lights about 
the Godhead's throne. On either side of this, the 
bright figures of the more marked constellations 
shone out in lustrous lines, solemn as the symbols 
traced by the Unseen Hand in strokes of fire upon 
the wall; and here and there, some larger star 
or stray planet arrested the eye, as it was seen 
shining alone in the pale violet air — a little ball 
of white light, bright as a glow-worm in a hedge- 
row. Xot a cloud was to be seen; the moon, 
which had not long risen, hung a little above the 
horizon, like a big pearl upon some Indian prince's 
neck, and poured from out her opal urn such a 
flood of virgin beams that the white lustre came 
streaming across the ocean to the shore in a nar- 
row rippling rivulet of molten silver, flowing as 
it were through the parted waters of the sea ; 



THE RIGHT ROAD. 229 

and as the billows fell languidly upon the beach, 
the very moonbeams seemed to curl over there, 
and then spread themselves out into a broad, 
shallow sheet of splendor far along the sands. 

The earth itself was almost as lovely as the sky 
and sea. Though all color had faded from the 
world, and Nature looked sombre as a sister of 
charity in her sad -colored garb — though the 
woods had no more tint in them than black clouds 
of smoke welling up out of the ground — though 
the roadways were white as snow-drifts with the 
moonlight, and the fields like plates of steel, with 
the cottages glistening in the beams as if they 
had been cut out of marble, still, what exquisite 
"value" did the neutral tones and half dusk of 
the night give to the little sjDecks of light that 
were seen sliining here and there in the distance, 
now alone from out the windows of some solitary 
homestead, and now thick as a swarm of fireflies 
from amid the haze of some far-off village ! 

The neighboring town of Boston itself, with 
the moonlight drenching its endless ridges of 
roofs, so that they appeared to be positively wet 
with the beams, and the dusky forms of the tall 
steeples and towers melting, spectral-like, into the 
cold gray background of the sky, was indeed a 
noble sight at such an hour. The million window- 
panes were like so many squares of burnished 
gold with the multitude of the lights in the houses, 
and these were reflected in the tide that washed 
the peninsular pedestal of the city, so that the 
water seemed a-blaze with the long bright streaks 
of fire mirrored in it ; and there they kept flashing 
with every ripple of the waves, till they appeared, 
now like so many fiery snakes diving deep into 
the ocean, and now like a flight of rockets shoot- 
ing downward in long meteor-like trails. 

There was hardly a sound to be heard. The 



■rM YOUNG BENJAJIIN FKANKLIN. 

rippling of the Avaves upon the sands was as gen- 
tle as a summer breeze rustling through a forest. 

The clatter of the work-day world had ceased; 
the hum of the town Avas hushed ; the country- 
silent as a tomb. The only noises that came 
fitfully upon the ear were the occasional barking 
of some startled farm-dog far away in the coun- 
try, or the muffled throb and splash of some poor 
fisherman's oars at work in the ofting, or else the 
bells of the many church clocks of the town toll- 
ing the hour, one after another, in a hundred dif- 
ferent tones. 

" Now, my little man," said Uncle Benjamin, 
after he had sat for a while silently contemplating 
the grandeur of the exquisite scene before him, 
"here at least we shall be secure from interrup- 
tion ; and here, lapped in the very sublimity of 
creation, let us try and find out which is the right 
road to worldly happiness." 

The little fellow curled his arm about the old 
man's neck, and looked into his face, as much as 
to say he was ready and anxious for the lesson. 

" Well, then, Ben, of course you have never 
asked yourself how many difterent kinds of pleas- 
ure there are of which human nature is suscepti- 
ble," began the tutor. 

" No, that I haven't, I'm sure," was the frank 
reply ; " but, bless me, uncle, I should say, from 
the specimens we have seen, that there are as 
many difierent pleasures as there are men in the 
world, for each person we visited seemed to find 
enjoyment in almost the very opposite pursuit to 
that of his neighbor." 

" Ay, my son ; but those you saw," said Uncle 
Benjamin, " were each a type of a large class in 
life. I showed you, purposely, but one member 
of each different order of characters among man- 
kind. But had we, instead of picking our way 




Air ! 



(<' 1 



UNCLE LLN ^0*^TS OLT THi. EIGHT EOAl) TO V\01iDL\ UAPPINESS. 



THE RIGHT KOAD. 233 

throngli the town, gone regularly on from house 
to house, you would have found that there are 
many misers in society like the one we saw, and 
a whole multitude of drunkards differing but little 
from the individual drunkard we visited, as well 
as a host of poets, and a large family of gluttons, 
philosojDhers, and fops, besides innumerable sports- 
men, musicians, amateur mechanics, artists, and 
antiquaries, and that they have all, more or less, 
the same peculiarities and propensities as the 
types I introduced you to ; so that, though geog- 
raj^hers divide the several branches of the great 
human family into nations, according to the mere 
patch of earth they are located upon, there is, 
nevertheless, more difference of nature often to be 
found between African and African, or Spaniard 
and Spaniard, or even between Yorkshireman and 
Yorkshireman, than between miser and miser^ or 
drunkard and drunkard." 

" How strange it would be, then, uncle," re- 
marked the boy, smiling at his own idea, " if all 
the misers were made to live together, and parted 
off into a separate nation, as well as all the drunk- 
ards, and poets, and philosophers, and sportsmen, 
and others too. Then we should have the king- 
dom of Misers and the empire of Drunkards, 
I suppose, or Hunksland and Sotland, as they 
would be called perhaps — as England and Scot- 
land were, you know, after the Angles and the 
Scots ;" and the boy laughed outright at the no- 
tion as he said, " Wouldn't it be droll, eh ? and 
I'm sure it would be a much better arrangement 
than now, for then all of the same tastes and dis- 
positions would be gathered together, like one 
family in the world." 

" But you'll find out, my lad," rejoined the un- 
cle, "before you have lived many years longer, 
that ' birds of a feather do flock together^ as the 



234 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

saying goes ; your drunkards liob-a-nob with their 
brother drunkards in the tap-room ; gluttons fra- 
ternize with gkittons at public dinners and feasts ; 
fops with fops at evening parties and balls ; schol- 
ars with scholars in colleges and learned societies ; 
sportsmen with sportsmen in the field and at bet- 
ting-places ; and philosophers with philosophers 
in scientific academies and institutes. The world 
is broken 11^3 into sects as much by the ' non-con- 
forming' of tastes as of religion, Ben, and each 
diflerence of creed is the same heresy to those 
who have a pet faith of their own. But we must 
keep to our point, lad," he added. " I asked you 
how many diflerent kinds of pleasure human na- 
ture is susceptible of and mind, I say ' kinds,' 
not species, but classes, which include a large 
number of difiereut varieties of pleasure within 
th^m." 

" I'm sure I can't say," the little fellow rephed, 
with a shake of the head ; " I can hardly under- 
stand the words you use, uncle." 

" Well, then, let me explain," continued the oth- 
er. "Every state into which our mind can be 
thrown must be either a sensation, a thought, or 
an emotion ; hence it follows that any pleasura- 
ble state of mind must be either a pleasure of the 
senses, a pleasure of the intellect, or a pleasure of 
the heart, so to speak, supposing the heart to be 
the organ of the emotions." 

" Oh ! I think I see what you mean now, un- 
cle," returned the youth, with considerable quick- 
ness, jumping as he did at once at his uncle's 
idea. " You would say, I suppose, that all pleas- 
ures must belong to one of those three kinds of 
pleasure ; they must be either sensual pleasures, 
or intellectual pleasures — or — or — what's the 
name for the other ?" 

" Moral pleasures," said the old man, " thougli 



THE KIGHT ROAD. 235 

it is but a sorry title at best ; still, as it is the 
term usually applied, we will not stop to split 
hairs, or quibble, hke lawyers, about words." 

" So, then, all the different pleasures that we 
found the persons pursuing in our journey through 
the town," the lad went on saying, half to him- 
self, delighted now that he had got hold of some- 
thing like a clew to the mystery, " were either 
sensual, intellectual, or — or moral ones. Let me 
see ! let me see !" he continued, musing, " wheth- 
er I can make it out by myself. The drunkard's 
was a — a — sensual pleasure, of course, and so was 
the epicure's ; and the poet's was an intellectual 
one. Yes, of course it was, and so was the phi- 
losopher's too ; and the miser's was — was — what 
would you call the pleasure the miser found in his 
money, eh, uncle? It can't be intellectual; 1 
should think it's sensual, isn't it ?" 

" No, lad ; the love of money belongs to the 
class of moral pleasures," was the answer. 

" Why, there's nothing moral about that., I'm 
sure," returned the pupil, with more frankness 
than deference to his teacher. 

"There is no more true morality in money- 
grubbing, Ben," added the old man, " than there 
is*profound intellect in collecting bits of old pave- 
ment and old tiles; and yet it is avarice that 
makes the one pleasure congenial to the miser, 
even as knowledge gives a zest to the other with 
the antiquary." 

" But avarice is greediness after money, isn't it, 
uncle? and if the greediness of the epicure is sen- 
sual, why shouldn't the miser's gluttony for the 
guineas be called the same?" argued the boy, 
who was not at all pleased to hear the passion of 
the old hunks dignified into a moral pursuit. 

" Why, my lad," answered Uncle Benjamin, 
*' simply because it is not the senses that enjoy 



236 YOUNG BENJAMIN PEANKLIN. 

the money, as the palate does the food or drink, 
but the sordid heart that finds dehght in it. 
Granted the greed of the one is no more enlight- 
ened or refined than that of the other — for there 
are degrading moral pleasures as well as degrad- 
ing sensual ones, Ben ; but the delights of human 
nature are simply sensual, intellectual, or moral, I 
say again, according as they are enjoyed either 
by the senses, the mind, or the heart of man." 

" Oh, I understand now," responded the pupil. 
" But, imcle," he cried, the moment afterward, 
" what's the use of these grand names and nice 
distinctions? they don't seem to me to give a 
chap any real knowledge of the nature of the 
pleasures themselves, after all." 

" Well said, my son, well said !" the old man 
replied, as he pressed the pet boy to his bosom. 
" I'm glad to see you are not to be put ofi" with 
mere big words, Ben. But it so happens in this 
case that the grand terms are not simply hard 
names invented to confound the vulgar, but they 
mark distinctions which enable us to study a num- 
ber of different things at once — to group together 
a large variety of human pleasures, and thus find 
out what is common to all of that same kind, in- 
stead of our having to criticise each isolated pleas- 
ure successively ; so that when we have once par- 
celed out all the delights of mankind into the de- 
lights either of the senses, intellect, or heart, we 
can ascertain the peculiar attributes of each dis- 
tinct class of delight merely by attending to the 
peculiar characteristics of sensation, thought, and 
emotion in all mankind." 

"Ah ! I see," exclaimed the boy, thoughtfully ; 
"but isn't it very diflicult to find out what are 
these peculiar characteristics, as you call them ?" 

"The knowledge can be gained only by pro- 
found reflection and long attention to the mat- 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 237 

ter," was the answer. " However, let us begin at 
once with the sensual pleasures, and see what 
worldly wisdom we can gather from even a cur- 
sory review of them, my little man." 

The boy again placed himself in a convenient po- 
sition for listening as he said, "Yes, uncle, go on." 

THE PLEASURES OF THE SENSES. 

" In the first place, then," commenced the god- 
father, " I should tell you that a sensation, accord- 
ing to the strict meaning of the term, always re- 
quires an external cause to give rise to it, where- 
as a thought has always an internal origin, being 
excited in the mind, in every case, by some pre- 
ceding mental state. For instance, this rock pro- 
duces in me a sensation of roughness as I draw 
my hand along it, and this makes me think of the 
texture of other rocks, and then, inwardly com- 
paring the one with my remembrance of the oth- 
er impressions, I judge what quality of stone it is 
by the mere touch. The external body thus ex- 
cites the sensation in my mind, and this inward 
sensation produces the thought of other bodies 
like it, and that thought again induces the com- 
parison and ultimate judgment. The first im- 
pression had an outward origin ; the ideas which 
followed it were all excited within me, the one 
mental state giving rise to the other." 

"I understand," said the attentive listener. "A 
sensation" — and he went over the distinction so 
as to impress it the better on his memory — 
" comes from something outside of us ; a thought 
is excited by something within." 

"Well, then, my boy," continued the other, 
" this being understood, of course it follows that 
we can have as many different sensations as we 
have different means of communicating with the 
outward world, or as there are, so to speak, dif- 



238 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

ferent doors and inlets to our mind. Now, how 
many diflerent organs of sensation have we, lad ? 
You know that^ Ben, I suppose ?" 

" Oh yes, uncle, we have five senses, I know," 
replied the youth. " Let me see, wdiat are they? 
Seeing" (and he told them oiF, one after the other, 
on his fingers as he spoke), "hearing, tasting, 
smeUing, and feeling; yes, that's the five, all told." 

" True, my man," added the uncle ; " but a per- 
son may have many other sensations than such as 
come in through the organs of sight, sound, smell, 
taste, and touch. These are the five principal 
gates to the brain, certainly, but beyond them 
there is the general sense of heat and cold, as 
well as the several ap23etites of the body, all of 
which have an external origin as much as any 
other sensations of which we are susceptible. The 
gastric juice, for example, from the action of 
which on the stomach the feeling of hunger is 
said to proceed, is as much external to the mind 
as the soft, warm breeze which I feel now as it 
sweeps past my cheek." 

" Go on," said the boy, as the old man paused 
for a minute to see whether the little fellow could 
follow him. 

" And besides these, Ben," the godfather pro- 
ceeded, " there is that indefinite sensation which 
comes from the natural and genial action of every 
function throughout the human frame Avhen in a 
state of absolute health, or the sense of convales- 
cence, as it is termed, and which has no particu- 
lar organ to develop it, but arises from the fit 
operation of all the different parts of the system 
at once. Then again, lad, there is the sense we 
have of physical exercise, or that peculiar feeling 
which arises in the mind on the contraction of 
our muscles and play of our limbs, as well as the 
sense of effort that we experience when we en- 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 239 

deavor to exert our power in any great degree. 
And farther, there is the sense of ease or satisfac- 
tion that we feel either after resting from fatigue, 
or on the allaying of any appetite, or the relief 
of any bodily pain. Lastly, there is the sense of 
stimulus or inordinate excitement, such as we ex- 
perience when the particular functions of our 
body are performed with unusual vigor, as upon 
the quickening of the circulation, or u^^on being 
thrown into that peculiar vivid state called mental 
emotion, and which seems to affect the body al- 
most as much as the mind. The same sense of 
stimulus also manifests itself in that peculiar im- 
pression of increased liveliness of system Avhich 
is usually called 'animal spirits.' And here, so 
far as I know, Ben," concluded Uncle Benjamin, 
" ends the catalogue of the distinct sensations of 
which mankind is susceptible." 

"Very good! very good!" cried the little fel- 
low ; " and now let me see whether I can remem- 
ber them all. First come the five principal sen- 
sations of seeing, hearing, smelling, tasting, and 
feeling; and then — let me see, how did you go 
on ? Oh yes ! then there is the sensation of heat 
and cold, and of the bodily appetites ; and after 
that you mentioned the sensation with the long 
name, you know — the sensation of— of perfect 
con — con — convalescence — yes, that's it; and — 
and — what's after that ? — don't you tell me, uncle. 
Oh, ay ! I've got it — of exercise and of effort; and 
then there is the sensation of ease or satisfaction; 
and, lastly, that of stimulus or — or — whatever was 
it you called it ? — some hard word or another, I 
know it was." 

" Or inordinate excitement," prompted the 
teacher. 

" Oh yes ; inordinate excitement, so it was," 
cried the boy (clapping his hands as the remem- 



240 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

brance of the words started back into his brain). 
"Do you think I went over those pretty well, 
uncle ?" 

" Excellently, my little man ; and I am the more 
pleased, because the ease with which you recalled 
my words shows the intentness with which you 
must have listened to them," returned Uncle Ben- 
jamin, as he again fondled the little fellow, and 
told him, more by caresses than flattery, how de- 
lighted he was with his long patience. 

OF SENSUOUS PLEASUKE ITSELF. 

" Well, Master Ben," the old man resumed, "as 
we know the difierent sensations of which human 
nature is susceptible, we are now in a position to 
begin studying the pleasures connected with 
them ; for each organ of sense, I should tell you, 
boy, is not only capable of giving us some pecul- 
iar perception like those of light, heat, sound, 
odor, flavor, and substance, but it is also endow- 
ed with a fundamental capacity for conveying 
pain and pleasure, delight and disgust, in connec- 
tion with such perceptions ; and thus the light 
and heat, etc., which we perceive may be either 
painful or pleasant, agreeable or disagreeable to 
our feelings. Now it is with these additional or 
superimposed qualities that we have to deal, lad, 
rather than with the mere abstract percej^tions or 
impressions themselves." 

" I see," murmured little Ben. 

" But first let me point out to you, my son," 
the old man went on, " the bounty and the grace 
of this addition or extra endowment to our senses. 
The simple percej^tion of light and color only, for 
instance, or even of sound alone, would, it is ob- 
vious, have been quite suflicient for all the jDur- 
poses of mere sight and hearing ; but the adding 
of the aesthetic qualities, as they are called, the 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 241 

making of light and color beautiful, and sound 
melodious to us, is surely an act of high and spe- 
cial benevolence — a touch of gratuitous and lavish 
kindness, which, as it adds nothing to the utilities 
of life, but is a source of some of the purest and 
most generous of all earthly happiness, is a signal 
evidence of the goodness of God to us. Again, 
even the institution of 25ain itself, which has so 
puzzled the controversialists as to ' the origin of 
evil,' is, when physiologically considered, merely 
another motive to action in man. You know I 
told you before, Ben, nothing can move without a 
cause, and that there is a reason for every one of 
the actions among human beings and the lower 
animals which are continually going on in the 
world. With mankind, as you have seen, the 
chief stimulus to action is the pursuit of pleasure; 
it is the sense of delight to come that generally 
leads men to act in this way or that. But while 
the love of pleasure draws us almost insensibly 
along by the silken cord of our innate desires to- 
ward that which is agreeable to us, our inherent 
aversion from pain makes us instinctively shun 
that which is noxious to us. Like the two i^oles 
of a magnet, the one attracts and the other re- 
pels, but both act toward the same end : the re- 
pellent force not only drives the body away, but 
it turns it at the same time toward the attractive 
one. And as the opposite poles of the magnet, 
when it is bent into the form of a horseshoe, so 
that they may both operate simultaneously, act 
and react on each other, and have thus more than 
double the power of either force singly, so, lad, 
with pain and pleasure ; they are but two causes 
instead of one to produce the same effect — a dou- 
ble motive power to induce us to seek the good 
and avoid the evils of life. Then surely if it were 
benevolence to make us delight in goodness, as 
Q 



242 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the means of drawing us by the insensible attrac- 
tion of our own instincts toward that which is fit 
and proper for us, so was it even still greater 
benevolence to give us a natural loathing for what 
is hurtful to us, and thus to create in us an invol- 
untary aversion from the several ills the flesh is 
heir to. Viewed in this light, lad, evil is the very 
counterpart of goodness itself, and pain the twin- 
sister to pleasure." 

" So it is," exclaimed the little fellow ; " though 
I must say it does seem at first sight like as if 
pain, misery, and want had been created by an 
evil spirit rather than a good one — doesn't it, 
uncle ?" 

THE PLEASURES OF THE FIA^E PRINCIPAL SENSES. 

"And now, Ben, primed w^ith this knowledge 
as to the fundamental use of pain and jDleasure in 
the world, we will proceed forthwith to the con- 
sideration of the pleasures of the senses," the god- 
father went on. " Well, then, my boy, as each 
sense has been made susceptible of a certain form 
of pleasure and delight, it follows, of course, that 
there must be as many difterent forms of sensual 
pleasures as there are distinct sensations in man- 
kind." 

"Ah! I begin to see now why you wanted to 
make me acquainted with the diti:erent sensations 
themselves first," ejaculated little Ben. 

" There are, of course," added Uncle Benjamin, 
" the pleasures of the five princij^al senses to be- 
gin with. Above all, there are the pleasures of 
the eye ; and these mostly consist in the natural 
charms of lustre and splendor, bright colors and 
graceful forms, and hence the delight of all na- 
tions in pomp, show, and dazzle, as well as gaudi- 
ness and gewgaws. Hence comes the love of the 
precious metals, as being the more pleasing to the 



THE EIGHT ROAD. 243 

sight ; and the love of those pretty crystals call- 
ed jewels, as being the brightest hued and most 
brilliant little lumps of matter in the world about 
us ; hence, too, the love of fine robes, grand halls, 
gilt carriages, and gay liveries among the rich, as 
well as among monarchs and lord-mayors, and of 
tinsel and frippery even among chimney-sweeps ; 
ay, and of bright beads and peacocks' feathers 
among barbarous nations and savages. Nor is 
this all : the natural delight that even the most 
educated and refined feel in the contemplation of 
nature when decked in all the glory of summer 
vegetation ; in beholding the golden corn — the 
purple clover — the green meadows — the jeweled 
orchards — the bright blue sky — the snow-white 
clouds — the crystal waters — the sparkling fount- 
ains — the many-colored flowers, and the rich lus- 
tre of the sunlight, as well as the blanched sjol en- 
dor of the moonhght, and fiery fretwork of the 
stars — all is due principally to that wondrous 
palate of the eye, which makes such perceptions 
more or less pleasurable to the sense of vision in 
all mankind." 

" Go on, uncle, I like to hear this," exclaimed 
the boy, delighted with the crowd of pleasant as- 
sociations now called up in his mind. 

"Then, lad," he continued, " there are the pleas- 
ures of the ear, such as the warbling of the birds 
— the sweet plaint of the cuckoo — the rich notes 
of the nightingale, and the dulcet rapture of the 
lark ; the sound of woman's gentle and kindly 
voice — the laughter of infants — the murmur of 
the brooks — the hum of busy insect life — the buzz 
of the waterfall — the drone of the far-off sea — the 
chiming of the church bells — the ' soughing' of 
the wind, and even the negative delight which the 
same sense finds in the stillness of evening, the 
quietude of the Sabbath, and the solemn silence 
of the forest." 



244 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

The boy nodded as much as to say " Proceed." 

"ISText we have the pleasures of the j)alate, 
Ben," said the uncle, " and these are made up of 
the sweets and fruits of the earth, and the choice 
flavor of spices and ' sweet herbs,' as well as the 
pecuhar and grateful sapid qualities of the differ- 
ent kinds of meat, roots, and grain that constitute 
our food. Besides these, too, there is the deli- 
cious freshness of a draught of cool and sparkling 
spring water — the softness of milk — the richness 
of wine, and the pungency of spirits. Nor should 
we here forget the strange perverted taste for to- 
bacco, which, from being loathsome even to nausea 
at first, becomes, if long persisted in, not only 
pleasant, but generates an absolute craving, as 
hunger does in the system. 

"Farther," he added, after a slight f)ause, 
" there are the pleasures of the sense of smell, 
and these are not less manifold than the others. 
To this sense man owes a great part of his de- 
light in flowers and fruits, and also his taste for 
the cloying luxury of artificial perfumes — the fine 
aroma of spices — the rich fragrance of incense ; 
while among the daintier charms of the same or- 
gan may be included the delicate natural odor 
of early morning — of the new-turned earth — of 
new-mown hay — of burning weeds — of the nutty 
smell of the woods, and the fresh redolence of 
the sea ; moreover, even the negative delights of 
pure air and cleanliness spring partly from the 
like faculty. 

" Again, my boy, there are the charms peculiar 
to the sense of touch or feeling — that sense which 
is confined not alone to the finger-ends, but dif- 
fused over the whole skin. Among these may 
be ranked the delight we find in softness and 
smoothness, as well as in elasticity or yielding- 
ness. It is this sense which makes man feel pleas- 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 245 

Tire in' fine linen and velvety textures — in easy- 
chairs, soft couches, and beds of down ; and it is 
the peculiar fresh and glibsome feel of the skin in 
a state of perfect cleanliness that constitutes one 
of the main inducements to personal ablution. 
Farther, it is doubtlessly in the delight that the 
hand experiences in the palpabilities of finely 
rounded and gently swelling forms that lies the 
very foundation of our notions of beauty in lines 
and figures." 

"Now that's all the five senses, uncle," re- 
marked the boy, as his godfather came to a pause. 
" But then, you know, there's the sense of heat 
and cold, and the sensations of the diflerent ap- 
petites, and the sense of perfect what d'ye call it 
— perfect con — con — I never can remember that 
name ;" and, but for this little hitch in his mem- 
ory, the lad would assuredly have run through 
the whole catalogue once more. 

" Ay, boy ; but one thing at a time, Ben," cried 
out the uncle, who was getting anxious to bring 
this part of the lesson to a close. " The pleasures 
derivable from the sense of heat and cold are 
chiefly such as are afforded by warm clothing in 
winter, and cool, light garments in summer. It 
is this sense that makes a fine warm spring day 
so intensely delightful to us all ; this which ren- 
ders the sea-side, wdth its fresh, invigorating 
breezes, so pleasant in summer, as w^ell as the 
cool shady lanes of the country, and the exquisite 
umbrage and subdued light of the forest, so agree- 
able to every one at the same season. In the 
winter, on the other hand, the same sense makes 
us find pleasure in the shelter of our house and 
the cosiness of our own fireside ; and when the 
keen and stinging east wind is heard whistling 
without, or when the earth is white as an infant's 
pall with its sheet of snow, and we think of the 



346 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKUN. 

■wretched shoeless wanderers with nothing but 
their rent rags of clothes to cover them, and no 
roof to shelter their heads, why then, like the 
hypocrites of old, lad, we thank God we ' are not 
as one of these ;' and then our natural love of 
warmth makes us find a special blessing in the 
comforts of our own home, and the bright substi- 
tute for the sunshine that is glowing in the centre 
of our own hearth." 

THE PLEASURES OF HEALTH. 

" And now for the pleasures of the bodily ap- 
petites !" exclaimed little Ben, as soon as his god- 
father had finished with the other. 

"Nay, child, all in good time," was the an- 
swer ; " they must stand over for a while, till we 
come to the pleasures we experience from a sense 
of ease or satisfaction. The next subject is the 
pleasures of health, or those which arise from our 
sense of perfect convalescence." 

" Ah ! that's the word I wanted," shouted Ben, 
intensely pleased to get hold of it once more. 
" Perfect convalescence — perfect convalescence ; 
I won't forget it in a hurry again, I warrant." 

"Well, lad," said Uncle Benjamin, "the pleas- 
ures of health are of so indefinite aud subdued a 
character, that it is only when they are brought 
out by the contrast of a long illness that we are 
fully sensible of the great natural delight there is 
in a state of convalescence. Then, as the blood 
begins to tingle again softly in the veins, and to 
set every nerve sparkling, as it were, with the re- 
turning circulation, while the whole skin becomes 
alive with the faint tickling of its revived action 
— then, as the warm sunshine is felt to sink into 
the frame like a honeyed balm, and to pervade 
the body as if it were in an absolute bath of light, 
and the fresh breeze seems positively to play and 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 247 

fondle with the cheeks, softly as a woman s hand, 
as it sweeps past them, and to breathe the very- 
breath of life into the frame with the refreshing 
fanning of every gust — then, and then only, are 
we thoroughly conscious of the fine sensuous de- 
light that health affords us. It is the same prin- 
ciple of contrast, again, which gives the sense of 
health such charms in the memories of the old — 
ay, and even in their imaginations, too — Avhen 
they behold the stout limbs, the plump and rosy 
cheeks, the pinky and smooth skin of hearty chil- 
dren, and see the little things run and frisk with 
all the sportiveness and springiness of lambs, and 
hear them laugh with the fine wild joy of utter 
carelessness, full of life even to overflowing, and 
gushing with spirits, and with every fibre of their 
frame glowing and quickened with the delightful 
enlivenment of thorough bodily sanity. Ah! 
tTien what would not the aged and decrepit give 
for one hour's enjoyment of this same sense of 
perfect health again !" 

THE PLEASURES OF EXERCISE. 

" Now are you going to do the pleasures of the 
appetites, uncle ?" inquired the boy, who seemed 
to be still anxious that his teacher should keep 
to the order which he himself had laid down. 

" No, lad," the other made answer ; " the next 
sensual pleasure I shall touch upon is the natural 
delight of physical exercise, though in the slight 
glance I have just given at the enjoyment chil- 
dren find in their sports and gambols I have some- 
what forestalled the subject. The delight of ex- 
ercise (apart from the charms of external nature, 
and that enjoyment of change of air, which al- 
ways serve to increase, more or less, the pleasure 
we find in walking or riding) — the delight of ex- 
ercise, I say, seems to arise principally from the 



348 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

'working off' of that muscular irritability which 
is called ' fidgetiness' when it becomes excessive 
in the system. The blood, as it travels through 
the body, tends to irritate every fibre of the flesh 
and nerves, and this irritation gives the muscles a 
natural tendency to contract, in the same manner 
as if they were excited with the mere point of a 
pin, and hence the allaying of the uneasiness oc- 
casioned by the muscular irritability becomes a 
source of no slight pleasure to mankind. Again, 
in the act of exercise the whole system becomes 
quickened, and every function stimulated, while 
the health is improved as well as the spirits en- 
livened ; so that even were there no special de- 
light of its own connected with the sense of exer- 
cise, the mere pleasures of increased health and 
excitement would be sufficient to make it agree- 
able to us. But the delight that youths find in 
what are called athletic sports and games — the 
fine, manly pastimes of cricket, rowing, running, 
leaping, climbing, skating, riding, and even the 
more effeminate amusement of dancing — all OAve 
the greater part of their charms to the natural 
love of exercise in human nature. Again, the en- 
joyment of traveling (though of course the pleas- 
ure of seeing strange countries and customs enters 
largely into that kind of gratification) borrows 
not a few of its delights from the same sense ; and 
even that love of wandering, which is termed 
' vagabondage' (in those who can not afibrd to pay 
hotel bills), may be referred to the same cause. 
Indeed, it admits of a great question, too, whether 
that high princijile of freedom, which is called 
' the love of liberty,' is not part of that natural 
vagabond spirit in man, which, springing from an 
instinctive dehght in exercise, makes us averse 
from all restraint, and ready to burst through 
any impediment that may be opposed to the free 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 249 

use of our limbs or the natural exercise of our 
will." 

THE PLEASURES OF THE APPETITES. 

" And now, I suppose, you're going to touch 
uj)on the pleasures of the a2Dpetites — ain't you, 
uncle ?" again inquired the youth, after another 
pause ; for, boy-like, he was not a little taken with 
the subject. 

" Yes, my boy, they come next," the godfather 
returned ; " but the pleasures of the appetites — 
now that we have gone over those of the palate, 
which gives to eating and drinking the main part 
of their positive gratification — are mostly of a 
purely negative character — that is to say, the 
pleasure that essentially belongs to them consists 
chiefly in the removal of that pain or uneasiness, 
and consequent craving, which is the characteris- 
tic feeling of the appetite itself, and in the substi- 
tution of a state of perfect ease and satisfaction 
in its stead. As I said before, Ben, if hunger had 
been made a pleasure, man would have sat still 
and starved with delight ; and as the pain of hun- 
ger, or want, is one of the chief ills in the world, 
we have here another marked instance as to the 
benevolent origin of what is called ' evil.' But, 
though our appetites, lad, have been made pains, 
or at least uneasinesses, and that merely with the 
view of exciting us to seek the things necessary 
to appease them, the act of appeasing them has 
assuredly been rendered a special delight to us ; 
for not only has taste been superadded to the ap- 
petite, so as to make the food agreeable to the 
palate, but the feehng of satisfaction, ease, and 
contentment, which follows in the mind immedi- 
ately the craving is stopped, has been rendered 
one of the most tranquil and yet enjoyable states 
of which our nature is susceptible. Indeed, the 



250 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

delight that all men find in a sense of ease and 
satisfaction is j^erhaps one of the strongest ' cues 
to action' in human nature ; for not only does 
this pleasurable state of negation from pain or 
uneasiness immediately succeed in the mind on 
the allaying of the craving of the bodily appetite, 
but it follows every other state of bodily or men- 
tal disquietude that man can suffer, and makes 
the sense of relief from physical torture as intense 
a pleasure as any in life. The sense of effort, for 
instance, I have before told you, is always irk- 
some, and hence the uneasiness of what is called 
hard labor; and this is what all the world is en- 
deavoring to escape from, and ultimately settle 
down into a state of ease and comfort in their old 
age. No man in existence likes work, though 
there is a cant abroad that industry is pleasant ; 
for work is essentially what is irksome, whereas, 
directly the work becomes pleasant, it is ' play' 
or * amusement.' But man must work, as I said, 
to live, and all prefer even the irksomeness of toil 
to the agony of starving, while most men put up 
with the uneasiness of their present labor and 
strife for the purpose of acquiring the means of 
future ease and rest. But effort is not only irk- 
some, lad, even when exerted in a slight degree, 
but it is absolutely painful when prolonged to a 
great extent ; and it is always fatiguing when long 
sustained, and ultimately is overpowering. ISTow 
it is this sense of fatigue which invariably follows 
any long-continued series of efforts that makes 
the ease of rest and repose a source of intense de- 
light to the weary. You yourself, Ben, remember 
how you enjoyed your bed after that long pull at 
the sculls, when we were becalmed in the offing 
yonder ; and every one who has felt the fatigue 
of a very long walk, and known what it is to have 
every muscle positively sore and tender with the 



THE EIGHT KOAD, 251 

protracted exertion — the limbs stiff and cramped, 
and the joints seeming to grate against the bones 
with every bend — knows also that there is per- 
haps no luxury in life like rest. To many a la- 
borer, lad, who is forced to be working hard all 
the week, and to whom even the sleep of the 
se'nnight is insufficient to take the crick out of his 
back and aches out of his arms, the Sabbath is 
often a sabbath of mere bed, or, at least, a large 
slice of the enjoyment of the blessed day of rest 
with such people consists in a sleep in the fields. 
But not only does the natural delight in ease," he 
went on, " show itself in this way among the poor 
and hard-working portion of society, but the same 
principle is also strongly developed in the rich 
and indolent members of every community. It 
is this love of ease that makes your fine folk de- 
light in carriages, so that they may be dragged 
along through the air rather than be put to the 
exertion of walking ; and it is the same feeling 
which makes them delight in a retinue of serv- 
ants, to save them the trouble of doing the least 
thing for themselves. Again, the nice charm 
there is in what are called the ' comforts' of life 
derives its pleasure from the same source, for 
such comforts are but the means of removing cer- 
tain little household uneasinesses ; and the very 
delights of home itself may be referred to this 
same love of ease and quietude. To every En- 
glish heart, home and comfort are the main en- 
joyments of life, and yet it is but the love of ease 
and quietude that makes the peace and cosiness 
of our own hearth so acceptable after the day's 
labors, the day's cares, and the day's hubbub. 
And, finally, it is this very love of ease, rest, and 
tranquillity that makes the tired pilgrim through 
life (when the limbs are aching with their long 
journey, the back is crooked with the heavy load 



252 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

of years, and the ear is deaf with the noise and 
strife of the world) sigh for the long rest and 
sweet repose of heaven itself — the peaceful home 
of the spirit — the blessed comfort of the soul." 

THE PLEASUEES OE PHYSICAL EXCITEMENT. 

" And nQW," said the little fellow, " you've got 
to do the pleasures that come from what d'ye 
call it ? — that other long word you used." 

"Inordinate excitement, Ben," added the old 
man. " Yes, my boy, and these will not take us 
long to specify, for I have already, while speaking 
of the deUghts of health and exercise, pointed out 
to you how large a share of those pleasures are 
due to the increased stimulus given by them to 
the circulation, as well as to every function of the 
body. There is, of course, a strong physical en- 
joyment in feeling the blood go dancing through 
the veins, and in having a fine glow of new life, as 
it were, diffused throughout the entire frame ; to 
be conscious of a new vigor being infused into 
every fibre, and a fresh energy thrown into every 
limb ; to find the animal spirits suddenly rise and 
gladden our nature, like a burst of sunshine upon 
the earth ; to see the mist of the megrims grad- 
ually melt away from before the eyes ; to have 
bright and happy thoughts coAie bubbling up, 
one after another, into the brain, and feel the 
heart flutter with the very thrill of the invigo- 
rated system. Every one delights in the gentle 
excitement of cheerfulness as much as they dislike 
the wretched depression of melancholy — or ' low 
spirits,' as it is called ; and it is the sensual charm 
which is to be found in a state of increased bodi- 
ly excitement that leads your drunkard and your 
opium-eater to fly to potions and drugs as a means 
of producing it, while the gourmand, Avhose stom- 
ach and palate have grown dull and dead from 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 2M 

long indulgence in the highly-seasoned food of 
epicurism, resorts to the strong stimulus of sauces, 
spices, and shalotes, Cayenne, curries, and 'devils,' 
as the means of stinging his overworked gusta- 
tory nerves into something like liveliness. It is 
the more remarkable, too, that it is only with 
weak and diseased appetites and natures that such 
stimuU or inordinate excitements are required. 
The drunkard, whose stomach is jaded and spent 
with the continued goading of his ' drams,' must 
have a 'relish' — some salt, savory snack — before 
he can bring himself to touch any solid food ; the 
sick person, recovering from a long illness, is al- 
ways more or less squeamish in his taste, and re- 
quires the little that he does take to be cooked in 
some peculiarly dainty manner, in order that the 
rare delicacy of the dish may ' tempt' him, and so 
serve as a gentle stimulus to his flagging appetite. 
The same delight in excitement, indeed, prevails 
in every one of the sensed. The eye loves the ex- 
tra vivid impressions produced by the contrast of 
opposite colors — the juxtaposition of black and 
white, red and green, for example ; and even the 
natural antipathy we have from darkness, and the 
desire to revel in a ' blaze of light,' have their or- 
igin in the same tendency to delight in unusual 
vividness. To this principle, too, may be referred 
the charm we find in the solemn grandeur of the 
thunder-storm: in the instantaneous flash that 
lights up the whole heavens and the earth at once, 
and then suddenly leaves it in pitchy darkness ; 
in the unnatural stillness that reigns throughout 
all nature before the storm, to be broken at last by 
the wild clatter of the thunder-burst, that seems 
like the roar and tremble of an earthquake in the 
heavens themselves. These are not only the 
brightest and loudest eflects in the world, but 
contrast serves to render them even brighter and 



254 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

louder than they naturally are. Again, lad, in 
the sports and games of youth, it is the excite- 
ment of the play that lends as great gratification 
to the amusement as even the exercise itself." 

THE PLEASURE OF HABIT. 

" And now you've done, uncle, haven't you ?" 
said the boy, as the old gentleman came to a 
pause. 

" Not quite, my lad," the other made answer, 
" for there is still the sensual pleasure of habit to 
be mentioned in order to complete the catalogue. 
This pleasure, again, like those of health, exer- 
cise, ease, and excitement, has no particular organ 
to which it can be referred, but it is rather a de- 
light that admits of being connected with any or 
all of the more special sensations themselves. Of 
the strange pleasures which habit has the power 
of developmg in us — of its power to transform 
what is naturally irksome and even painful into 
delights, and to change aversions into propensi- 
ties, I have before spoken. I have pointed out to 
you that all which is required to work this mar- 
velous change is long-continued repetition, and 
that, too, at frequent and regular intervals ; but 
the change once wrought, the pleasure we derive 
from the object or practice to which we have be- 
come habituated is, perhaps, as great as any of 
our natural enjoyments. For instance, there is 
no doubt that the taste, and maybe even the smell 
of tobacco, is innately repulsive ; and yet, let any 
one persevere in the use of it — let him continue 
either smoking, chewing, or snuffing it, and after 
a time habit is sure to set in, and transform the 
instinctive loathing into a cultivated longing — 
the natural abomination into an artificial delicacy. 
It is the same with the eating of opium and the 
drinking of neat spirits. With the muscular ac- 



THE EIGHT ROAD. 255 

tions of the body, again, as well as the objects of 
the senses, the same principle of transformation 
holds good. You have already been told how 
the irksomeness of labor, Ben, can be converted 
into a comj^arative pleasure by habit, and it now 
only remains for me to draw your attention, lad, 
to some few other j)leasures of the same kind. 
Tlie pleasure of exercise, we all know, is so much 
increased by the habit of walking daily, that per- 
haps the chief punishment in imprisonment lies in 
the mental and bodily irritation which is felt when 
indulgence in the habit is prevented. Again, as 
I said before, there is pleasure even in whittling 
or paring sticks with a sharp knife, as you see the 
people continually doing in this part of the world; 
and, indeed, the simple habit in children of biting 
the nails produces so strong a desire to continue 
the practice that their hands have occasionally to 
be muffled, or their arms straj^ped behind, to pre- 
vent them indulging in the practice. Farther, 
there is the well-known story of the barrister, 
who always kept twiddling a piece of string when 
he was pleading, and who could be most eloquent 
while habitually engaged in unraveling the twine, 
but who couldn't get a word out if some wicked 
wag only stole the string before he began his ad- 
dress to the jury. Nor is this all ; so strong a 
hold does habit lay upon the mind, that the na- 
tional customs of a country are often as much re- 
vered as even the national religion itself; and not 
a few revolutions have been caused by the at- 
tempts of rulers to alter the habits and ceremonies 
of a people. There, now I have done, Master 
Ben," added the uncle, " and given you, I believe, 
a full list of the purely physical pleasures that our 
nature is capable of enjoying." 



256 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEAKKXIN. 



THE result: the business of life. 

"Thank you, nncle," said the lad, as he rose 
from the rock on which he had been seated ; " and 
now, I supi^ose, we can go ;" for, to tell the truth, 
though little Ben was a good listener for his 
years, he had almost had enough lecturing for one 
sitting. 

" Go, boy !" echoed the elder Benjamin, with 
pretended disdain ; " why, what did we come for, 
you rogue ? We came. Master Ben, to put you 
on the right road, but as yet we haven't advanced 
a step. We are only staring up at the sign-post 
still, and haven't even decided whether it will be 
better to go the way the senses would lead us, 
or whether we shall follow the path the intellect 
points out, or take the road the heart would coun- 
sel us to pursue." 

" Oh, ay ! no more we have, uncle. Do you 
know, I had forgotten all about tliat^^ answered 
the frank lad, who was too little skilled in the 
subtleties of dialectics to be able to keep the 
point of the argument always in view. " Well, 
then, I suppose,_now that you've explained all 
about the sensual pleasures, you're going to show 
me next why they're not so good as the intellect- 
ual or moral ones." 

" I never yet gave you to understand, lad, that 
they Avere not as good, in their way, as the oth- 
ers," was the gentle reproof. *' When kej^t with- 
in due bounds, and held to their proper objects, 
there is assuredly no harm in the pleasures of the 
senses." 

" Yes ; but what are those due bounds, as you 
call them, uncle ?" inquired the youngster. 

" The bounds of nature, boy ; the bounds of 
the fitness of things," the teacher replied. *' See 
here, Ben, and mark well what I say. The three 



THE EIGHT ROAD. 257 

main objects of life are these : business, amuse- 
ments, and duties. . It is the chief business of life 
to get food and clothing for the body ; to pro- 
vide ourselves and those who belong to us with 
shelter, and, if we can, with the comforts of exist- 
ence, as well as to lay by such a store as shall in- 
sure us the means of ease, if not affluence, in our 
old age. The main business of life, then, you per- 
ceive, lad, is merely to minister to the wants and 
delights of our senses, or, in other words, not only 
to prevent the pains and uneasinesses of the flesh, 
but to obtain some small share of the animal pleas- 
ures of existence. The addition of the feelings of 
delight and disgust to the mere perceptive facul- 
ties of the senses, Ben, I have before shown you, 
is a signal evidence of God's goodness to his 
creatures. Food is necessary only to reinvig- 
orate the body and allay the pains of appetite. 
No other quality was required for the mere pur- 
poses of continued animal existence ; but the Al- 
mighty has made food agreeable to the palate 
also. Light and color were all that was w^anted 
for vision, but He has made them beautiful as 
well ; sound alone would have been sufficient for 
hearing, but he has superadded melody and har- 
mony ; and it is only an ascetic bigot, therefore, 
who is insensible to the bounty of God's benev- 
olence in the world, that believes he is leading a 
righteous life in shunning all the graceful charms 
of sentient nature." 

The boy stared with astonishment to hear his 
half-Puritan godfather give vent to such senti- 
ments, and inquired, " Then why, uncle, were the 
epicure and the drunkard such oflfensive charac- 
ters?" . 

"Because, my lad, they ignored the stern busi- 
ness of life, and gave every thought of their mind, 
every affection of their heart, to mere animal pleas- 
R 



25S YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

lire. That form of pleasure which, kept withm its 
own natural bounds, is, remember, an a/i(er-grace, 
they made ^iwimary pursuit of; the sensual de- 
lights, which have been superadded as a graceful 
reward after the hard business of life has been 
done, they made the whole and sole business 
of their lives ; in other words, they strove, like 
dunces, to get the reward while they shirked the 
task," was the response. " The rudest form of an- 
imal life, Ben," he went on, " the last link in the 
long chain of sentient existence, is a polype, with- 
out eyes, limbs, heart, nerves, or, indeed, any or- 
gan of sense, and hardly of motion ; a mere an- 
imated stomach ; a living thing that you can turn 
inside out, and which still goes on performing its 
one function of eating and drinking as compla- 
cently as ever ; an animate creature that is all bel- 
ly and nothing else. The epicure and the drunk- 
ard, lad, are human polypes — the 'gastropods' 
of mankind, whose belly is the only organ that 
moves them, and stirred by which, like slugs, they 
go crawling and slavering along through the brief 
term of human existence. The business of life, 
my son, is to get the means of living ; but the 
means of living are wanted not merely to tickle 
the palate, but to enable us to satisfy all the crav- 
ings, requirements, and aspirations — all the du- 
ties, affections, and yearnings of our nature. The 
grand object, Ben, is to make the business of life a 
pleasure, and not the pleasures of life a business." 

" I think I understand what you mean by the 
business of life now, and see why the drunkard 
and the epicure are not worthy people." 

"There is but one other point now," said the 
old man, " and then I have really done, my child." 

" And what is that, Uncle Ben ?" the boy ask- 
ed, as he grew a little fidgety. 

" Well, lad," the godfather went on, " you re- 



THE EIGHT EOAD. 2S9 

member I pointed out to you at the beginning of 
the subject that our sensations all come from 
without ?" 

" Oh yes, I recollect you said that sensations 
always had an external cause, and thoughts an in- 
ternal one — those were your words, unky, dear," 
exclaimed the little fellow, roused by the i^ride of 
having an opportunity of showing how attentive 
he had been. 

" They were, Ben ; and such impressions, com- 
ing from without, of course do not depend upon 
ourselves," added the uncle. " We must go and 
hunt in the world for such objects as we desire to 
act pleasantly upon our senses. But these objects 
are often to be procured only by extreme labor 
on our parts, or at great cost, in order to induce 
others to part with them for our benefit. Hence 
sensual pleasures are always the most costly of 
all pleasures. The delights of the palate, for in- 
stance, are found chiefly in the more expensive 
viands, fruits, and wines, as well as the rare deli- 
cacies which are either brought from the farthest 
corners of the earth, or forced into maturity by 
great care and trouble at unusual seasons of the 
year. For the luxurious gratification of the eye, 
again, we need the show of superb services of 
plate — the dear finery of* jewels, and silks and 
satins, velvet and lace — the magnificence of state- 
ly halls, elegant furniture, and sj)lendid decora- 
tions — the prettiness of gay gardens, and the no- 
ble grandeur of parks. And it is the same with 
every other sense appertaining to human nature ; 
for the highly-prized objects of delight to each of 
the physical faculties are sure to be highly priced 
also. Indeed, the only means of sensual- enjoy- 
ment that we have really within our own power, 
and which does not require some external object 
for its gratification, is that of exercise ; for the 



860 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

objects upon which exercise expends itself are 
our own limbs and the muscles of our own body. 
Hence the games and sports which make this 
physical indulgence so agreeable to men as well 
as youth are sources of harmless and healthful 
pleasure always within our grasp, and hence the 
very exercise of labor itself, when quickened by 
the excitement of will or purpose, or transformed 
into a propensity by long habit — of labor, which 
is not only necessary to our independence, and 
even continued existence in the world — is a fac- 
ulty that Hes literally at our fingers' ends, and 
which may be made to contribute at once to our 
well-being and to our happiness. Finally, I should 
impress upon you, my boy, that with the undue 
indulgence in any mere physical delight there is al- 
ways some peculiar bodily evil connected. Over- 
indulgence of the palate brings gout, dyspepsia, 
apoplexy, and the utter ruin of bodily health; 
overdrinking causes delirium tremens, softening 
of the brain, and the soddening, even to fatuity, 
of the mind. Overwork, on the other hand, pro- 
duces premature old age and decay; and over- 
ease, in its turn, begets indolence, corpulency, and 
positive helplessness. These, my lad, are the 
worldly punishments instituted by the Great 
Judge over all — the brands which the Almighty 
prints on the brows of the fools and human beasts 
of the world, and that are intended to whisper 
* Beware' in the ears of the more wise and pru- 
dent." 

" Well, then," said the little fellow, " I think 
sensual pleasures are but sorry pleasures after all, 
uncle." 

" They are, as I said, lad, designed to render the 
business of life agreeable in the end, and hence 
were never intended to be made the primary pur- 
suit of man's existence ; and those who wrest 



THE RIGHT EOAD. 261 

them from their true pm*pose, and seek to trans- 
form them into amusements, must suffer for their 
folly. If men have no want of food, and Avill yet 
eat for the mere pleasure of eating some savory 
dish, they not only lack the natural relish of food, 
but they break a natural commandment, which 
ordained that hunger should stir men to seek food, 
and that the pleasure of eating it should be the 
reward of getting it. And the breach of this 
natural commandment brings, sooner or later, its 
own peculiar natural punishment — bodily enfee- 
blement instead of strength and vigor — injury 
rather than well-being — suffering and disease in 
the place of happiness and health." 

The words were barely uttered when Uncle 
Benjamin started as he cried "Hush! what 
o'clock's that?" and the sound of the big bell of 
the State House clock was heard booming in the 
silence of the night resonantly across the water. 

"One! two! three! four!" counted the old 
man, following each stroke as it burst upon the 
air. 

" It's nine, I'm sure, uncle," interjected little 
Ben. 

" Five ! six ! seven !" continued the other. 

" It must be nine," added the boy, " for we can't 
have been here more than two hours, and it wasn't 
quite seven, you know, when we started." 

"Eight! nine!" Uncle Benjamin kept count- 
ing as the other talked, and then, holding up his 
finger as he reckoned the ninth stroke, he waited 
for a moment or two, and at last shouted out, as 
he rose hastily from his seat, "Ten! as I'm a 
living sinner. Come along, Ben, come along; we 
shall have them all in bed before we get home, I 
declare." 



YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 



CHAPTER XVni. 

THE NEXT TURNING. 

The following night the same couple were seat- 
ed on the same lump of rock, looking at the same 
bright moon and stars, and engaged in solving 
the same subtle problem, "Which is the right 
road through life ?" 

" Now, then, Master Benjamin," began the 
good-natured old tutor, as freshly as if he ij^ere 
never tired of counseling his little godson as to 
how to live a righteous and sober life, " we have 
seen where one of the roads leads to ; we have 
learned that if we follow the path of mere sensual 
pleasure we must expect to pay heavy tolls and 
taxes by the way, and shall come to only disease 
and anguish at the end. So let us take a peep 
down the next turning, and see what looms in the 
distance there." 

" The next turning, as you call it, uncle, looks 
like a nice, quiet, shady lane to me," remarked 
the pupil, only too pleased to carry out the figure. 
" It's the path of intellectual pleasure, isn't it ?" 

" It is, my son," the other answered ; " and as 
the main object of the business of life is to stay 
the cravings and relieve the uneasinesses, as well 
as to contribute to the natural delights of the 
senses, so, with the amusements of life, intellect- 
ual pleasure is, or should be, more directly con- 
nected. The physical word for amusement, Ben, 
is recreation ; and a fine term it is, as expressing 
that re-enlivenment and reinvigoration of the ja- 
ded powers of body and mind which come from 
mental diversion. Enlightened amusement is 



THE NEXT TURNING. 263 

really mental refreshment — a cooling draught 
from a shady spring, that sobers and revives the 
soul after the heat of the work-day world far 
more than any of the fiery stimulants which the 
senses delight in. I told you, lad, you remember, 
when treating of the sense of effort, that it was 
always irksome, occasionally painful, and, if long- 
continued, fatiguing, and ultimately overpower- 
ing, for us to take any severe exertion. Now the 
natural means of removing fatigue is by rest ; for 
the sense of weariness, which oppresses the limbs 
after protracted labor, is merely the Almighty's 
voice whispering ' Hold ! enough !' and warning 
us not to overtax the powers He has conferred 
upon us ; and when this weariness sets in, the 
craving for rest which he has implanted in us tells 
us that mere repose alone is sufficient for the re- 
cruitment of the spent animal strength and spir- 
its. But the change' that rest produces in the 
frame passively^ amusement, or mere diversion of 
the mind from the laborious pursuits, brings about 
actively. The action of diversion recreates and 
reinvigorates as much as positive inaction or re- 
pose, and hence amusement after the day's busi- 
ness and labor have been done is as healthful as 
rest itself — ay, and as necessary too, for the res- 
toration of that elasticity of energy — that spring 
of body and mind — which is requisite for the 
doing of the business and labor of to-morrow." 

Little Ben was delighted to learn the philoso- 
phy of amusement, for, boy-like, he was quite suf- 
ficiently in love with recreation to be glad to hear 
that there was not only an excuse, but really a 
reason for indulging in the pleasant pastimes of 
life ; so he chimed in, " Yes, uncle, I've often 
heard you tell father that ' all work and no play 
makes Jack a dull boy,' and now I know the 
truth of the saying." 



264 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKXIN. 

" Ah ! lad, but always bear in mind the con- 
verse of the proverb," was the rejoinder, " ' that 
all play and no work makes Jack a beggar-boy.' " 

THE PLEASURES OF THE INTELLECT. 

" Well, Ben, with this little preface," the uncle 
resumed, " we now pass on to consider the sev- 
eral intellectual pleasures themselves. To each 
intellectual faculty of our nature, then," he be- 
gan, "there is, of course, some special associate 
mental delight attached, in the same manner as 
there is some peculiar kind of animal pleasure 
connected with the various organs of Sense ; and 
I might proceed with this part of our subject by 
explaining to you, in due order, all the particular 
pleasures of the memory — the pleasures of the 
imagination — the pleasures of the judgment — the 
pleasures of reason — the pleasures of art — the 
pleasures of abstraction, and so on. But this 
mode of procedure would convey to you, compar- 
atively speaking, but little knowledge as to the 
mainsprings or sources of such pleasures, and I 
want to give you a deej^er insight into your own 
nature, my child, than comes of mere classifica- 
tion or orderly arrangement. I want to let you 
see that the general capacities for enjoyment in 
man are really the same in the intellect as in the 
senses themselves, and that the only difference is, 
that with the various forms of mental delight the 
pleasure comes in through the operation of the 
thoughts, while in the various kinds of animal 
delight the gratification enters through the action 
of some organ of sensation. Now, lad, let me 
hear whether you can enumerate the different 
kinds of sensuous pleasure of which human na- 
ture is susceptible, over and beyond those which 
belong to what are called the five senses, and also 
that of heat and cold, for these we have done with." 



THE NEXT TUENING. 265 

Young Ben put his head to one side, and rub- 
bed away at his scalp as hard as a cat does occa- 
sionally at its ear, as he exclaimed, " Let me see ! 
there's the pleasure of the sense of perfect conva- 
lescence ; I remember that, because of that plaguy 
hard word. And then there's another one, with 
a long-winded title, too, but he comes at the last, 
I know ;" the boy went on talking away, as he 
tried to recall the sensations in the -order his un- 
cle had gone over them. " Oh yes ! then there 
is the pleasure of exercise, and the pleasure of 
ease and satisfaction ; and then comes Mr. Crack- 
jaw, and he's called the pleasure of — of — don't 
you tell me now — of — inordinate excitement. 
Yes, that's it !" he added, as the thought came 
out with a pop, like the cork from a bottle of 
soda-water. " Oh ! but wait a minute," he cried, 
as he saw his uncle still looking at him, as much 
as to say he had forgotten something — " and then 
there's the pleasure of habit as well." 

"Bravo, little man, bravo!" cheered the old 
boy, for really the uncle was as pleased with the 
feat as the little fellow himself. "And now, 
omitting the pleasures of health, I want to show 
you, Ben, that we find the same delight in mental 
exercise as in the exercise of our bodies; the 
same pleasure in the satisfaction of our minds, 
and freedom from any state of mental uneasiness, 
as in the allaying of any bodily craving or un- 
pleasantness ; the same gratification in vivid 
thoughts and perceptions as in extra-lively sensa- 
tions and bodily stimulants ; and the same enjoy- 
ment in the indulgence in particular habits of 
thinking as well as feeling." 

"How strange!" murmured the lad; "but I 
can't see how you'll ever make it all out, though." 

" The delights of exercise, satisfaction, inordi- 
nate vividness, and habit," continued the god- 



266 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

father, " are as strongly marked in the mind as 
in the body; and as the corresponding physical 
impressions appear to come in through no special 
organ of sense, but to be impressions that admit 
of being associated with all or any of our physical 
faculties, so the capacity for these kinds of pleas- 
ure would seem to be general capacities that are 
capable of being united to the operations of the 
mind as well as that of the senses, and to be the 
means of enjoyment, as it were, underlying all 
our bodily and mental powers at one and the same 
time." 

THE PLEASURES OF MENTAL EXERCISE. 

" Let us begin with the pleasures of mental ex- 
ercise." 

The lad nestled up close to his godfather, and, 
curling the old man's arms about his neck, ar- 
ranged himself in a comfortable j^osture for list- 
ening. 

" The principle of the ' association of ideas,' as 
it is called," commenced the tutor — "that prin- 
ciple by which thought is linked with thought in 
the mind, and which causes conception after con- 
ception, and remembrance after remembrance to 
keep on forever sweeping through the brain (like 
the endless procession of clouds across the sky, 
or the interminable succession of waves over the 
sea) is the principal means by which the mind is 
moved from object to object, and made to appear, 
even to the individual himself, to pass through a 
series of images and recollections rather than the 
images and recollections seeming to flit success- 
ively through it. It is this movement of the 
mind, this transition from one state to another, 
which corresponds with that gradual change of 
place and play of limb which is termed exercise in 
the body ; and as we are conscious of a continued 



THE NEXT TURNING. 26T 

action going on within our physical system every 
time we move our muscles (apart from the mere 
sensations of the flesh), so are we sensible of the 
same kind of action perpetually occurring within 
us during the process of mental exercise. Indeed, 
as our limbs move, whether voluntarily or instinct- 
ively, only in answer to some preceding fiiental 
state, it is probably nothing more than the suc- 
cession of these difierent mental states — the con- 
tinued acts of volition or series of instinctive im- 
pulses felt in the mind — that impresses us with 
the sense of bodily exercise itself. 

"Well, lad," Uncle Benjamin went on, after a 
brief pause, " having now settled that the sense of 
exercise is one and the same feeling, whether the 
action be in the body or mind, let us pass on to 
the enumeration of the mental pleasures which 
proceed from it. That there is a natural charm 
in the mere exercise of the mind — in the contin- 
ued gradual transition from one mental state to 
another — is shown in the delight that is generally 
felt in indulging -in those kinds of ideal pano- 
ramas, those long trains of flitting fancies, that 
pass half-pictured before the 'mind's eye' even 
in our waking moments, and which are termed 
' day-dreams,' or ' reveries,' or ' wool-gathering.' 
Again, the pleasures of contemplation and medi- 
tation — of ' brown studies,' as they're termed — 
are due to the same principle ; and so is the de- 
light that some find in planning and inventing, 
and even in building what are called ' castles in 
the air.' Indeed, any mental process that excites 
thought after thought readily and steadily within 
us produces (as the ideas keep sweeping through 
the mind) a kind of mellifluence, as it were, in the 
brain, that is essentially agreeable to our nature. 
Again, the pleasures of conversing, discoursing, 
and reading may be all referred to the like cause ; 



268 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

for, apart from any special charm there may be in 
the different ideas thus introduced into the mind, 
there is a dehght in the mere mental occupation 
and exercise that such acts afford us. Farther, it 
is in the suggestiveness of certain subjects and 
ideas, as well as of certain objects in nature, and 
consequently in the exercise they afford to the 
mind, that a great part of natural and artistic 
beauty inheres. It is also on account of this sug- 
gestive property that keepsakes, relics, heir-looms, 
portraits, and mementoes generally, make up the 
most highly-prized portion of every person's treas- 
ure, serving, as they do, to revive or recall a long 
train of happy associations in connection with 
some beloved object, and that with a vividness and 
force that mere memory, without some such sug- 
gestors, could not possibly attain. For the same 
reason, the favorite old haunts of former days, or 
the birthplaces or residences of the illustrious 
dead, and the ruins of ancient countries, castles, 
or abbeys, are objects of more or less beauty in 
the eyes of every one, and they are so principally 
for their power of suggesting to us the thoughts 
of all the glory of the times connected with them. 
Again, many of our mental pastimes are sources 
of pleasure only as affording exercise, or acting as 
springs of suggestion to the mind. This is the 
case especially with the light amusement of rid- 
dles, and those tantalizing charms called ' puzzles.' 
Moreover, many forms of wit — the wit of innuen- 
does and inferences, for instance — derive their de- 
light simply from this principle of mental exercise, 
i. e., by leaving the mind to suggest the thought 
intended to be conveyed. Thus, in the old joke, 
we are told that a townsman said to a country- 
man, who was leaning listlessly over a gate, that 
he looked as if he couldn't say * Boh to a goose ;' 
whereupon the chawbacou shouted ' Boh' at the 



THE NEXT TURNING. 269 

other in reply. Now in this * lively sally,' as it is 
called, it is obvious that the liveliness lies not alone 
in the readiness of the retort, but in the sly way 
in which it suggests to us that the townsman is 
one of the silly old birds that are sometimes caught 
by chaff. So, too, in the anecdote — " 

" Yes, uncle, that's right," interposed little Ben, 
who was still chuckling over the relish of the last 
jest, and all agog with delight at the prospect of 
another anecdote. " Go on : isn't it prime, that's 
all!" 

" In the anecdote, I say, lad, where a would-be 
witty officer is said to have asked a Roman Catho- 
lic priest why the papist clergymen were like 
donkeys, and to have answered, when the priest 
* gave up' the riddle, ' Because they all had crosses 
on their backs ;' whereupon the sly old papist, who 
was determined not to be outdone, demanded in 
his turn whether the soldier could tell what was 
the difference between a military officer and a 
jackass ; and on the other shaking his head, and 
saying he ' couldn't see it,' the priest added sim- 
ply, ' No more can I !' — in this anecdote, I repeat, 
we have another illustration of the same kind of 
suggestive wit, namely, in the sly inference of the 
priest that he couldn't see any difference between 
the two creatures." 

" Oh, I take it now !" exclaimed the lad, thump- 
ing the air with his fist as his godfather threw in 
the explanation. " Th^ priest was a sly rogue of 
a fellow, wasn't he, uncle ?" the boy added, while 
he rolled about, and went into such convulsions 
of positive horse laughter that the chuckle sound- 
ed very much like a neigh. 

"Ay, Ben ; and the delight you find in such sly 
roguery shows you the pleasure there is in sug- 
gesting or inferring rather than saying what we 
have to say, and thus leaving it to the mind to 



270 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

take up the sense by some act or exercise of its 
own. In irony, moreover, the very opposite is 
said from vrhat is meant to be understood, and 
the true sense implied only by the tone and man- 
ner of saying it, as when I call you ' a young 
rogue' and ' a little rascal' by way of endearment, 
Ben" (and, as the old man uttered the words, he 
shook the pet boy playfully by the ear). "In 
poetry, also, the like principle of suggestion is 
often made to act as a stimulus to the imagina- 
tion, and to give by such means a high beauty 
to the art. Slilton, for instance, in speaking of 
death, says very finely, 

" 'And on what seemed a head he wore a crown.'* 

"Indeed, a hundred such examples of the beau- 
ty of the suggestive principle in art might be giv- 
en ;f so that there can be no doubt, Ben, that exer- 

* The same beauty of the suggestive principle in pictorial 
art is shown in shrouding with the hands the features of fig- 
ures in extreme grief; while in musical art, Beethoven's 
pastoral symphony, and Gliick's overture to "Iphigenia," 
and Mendelssohn's "Midsummer Night's Dream," are illus- 
trious instances of the suggestivity of the works of the high- 
est composers. 

t The three most suggestive poems, perhaps, in the En- 
glish language are Wordsworth's "We are seven," Cole- 
ridge's "Ancient INIariner," and Edgar Poe's "Raven ;" and 
they may be said to take precedence as to beauty in the or- 
der in which they are here set down. The little unadorned 
gem of Wordsworth is assuredly the finest thing of the kind 
ever penned. The opening prelude, as to the great mystery 
of death to a little child, and then the exquisitely-innocent 
and touching manner in which the wee thing numbers the 
dead brother as one of the family still living, and the sweet, 
tender, and yet profound grace of the recurring burden " We 
are seven, " is such a masterly opening-up of the highest su- 
pernatural speculation, in connection with the simplest and 
prettiest little bit of nature conceivable, that the mind, after 
reading the verses, oscillates between the tender and inno- 
cent rustic beauty of the child, and the mystic, shadowy sub- 
limity of death, rapt in a profound day-dream of delight and 



THE NEXT TURNING. 2T1 

cise of the mind is as grateful as that of the body ; 
and that whatever serves to stir the thoughts, 

wonder. How different, on the other hand, and yet how 
grand, is the weird, curse-like tone of Coleridge's preternat- 
ural ballad ! It wants the gentle beauty of Wordsworth's 
little morsel to charm us, but it has, at the same time, an al- 
most Shakspearian power about it to awe us. Coleridge car- 
ries the terror and grandeur of nature to the very verge of 
the imagination. He takes the mind, as it were, to the far 
end of the earth and ocean — to the edge of the great preci- 
pice, and gives us just a peep of what lies beyond ; he lets 
us look down, so to speak, into the dizzy well of infinite 
space. But Wordsworth lifts us above all natural things. 
The spirit flies with him away out of space altogether, and is 
lost in the lovely dream-land of the immaterial world to 
come. We are set thinking of the angels, and listening to 
angel music, by the innocent words of one who seems like a 
little earth-angel herself. Edgar Poe's poem, on the con- 
trary, derives its force from its overcasting the mind with a 
totally different feeling. There is a fine haunted sense left 
upon the soul after reading it. We have an oppression of 
fatalism, such as loill come upon us (despite all our philoso- 
phy) after reading about death-fetches, omens, forebodings, 
and ugly dreams that seem to have been fulfilled. Never- 
theless, despite the fine suggestions induced by the American 
poet, the poem itself is very thin and feeble after Coleridge's 
noble imaginative work, and does not admit of being com- 
pared for a moment with Wordsworth's graceful cherub 
strain. I have heard great musicians (such as my old friend 
and teacher, John Barnett) say, that the peculiar charm of 
Beethoven's Pastoral Symphony is its wonderful suggestivity 
also ; that it lulls the finely-attuned musical mind into a pas- 
toral reverie, as it were, carrying it away, and lapping it in 
the very bosom of nature itself — now in the fields, now in the 
woods, and now by the brook side — and yet lighting it up 
softly with that reverent tone which the contemplation of 
Nature in her quietude, or even in her grandeur, always in- 
duces. 

Mr. Dickens has often recourse to the suggestive form of 
wit, or making a part stand for — or rather convey a sense of 
— the whole, to produce some of his happiest effects. Sam 
Weller's well-known description of the inmates of the White 
Hart Inn in the Borough, by the boots he had to clean, af- 
fords us as graphic a picture of the persons staying in the 
tavern as an elaborate painting of the characters themselves.. 



272 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

and give play to the faculties within us, tends to 
gladden and inspirit us as much as the movement 

''There's a pair of Hessians in 13," said he, in answer to an 
inquiry as to what people they had in the house ; ' ' there's 
two pair of halves in the commercial ; there's these here 
painted tops in the snuggery inside the bar, and five more 
tops in the coffee-room, besides a shoe as belongs to the icoocl- 
en leg in No. 6 ; and a pair of Wellingtons, a good deal worn, 
together with a pair of lady's shoes, in No. 5." 

Again, the Shepherd with his "Wanities," and Sam's in- 
quiry as to which " partickler wanity he liked the flavor on 
best,'' is another happy illustration of the intellectual charm 
that lies in the suggestive process of wit or humor. 

" 'Wot's your usual tap?' asked Sam of the red-nosed 
gentleman. 

"'Oh, my dear young friend,' replied Mr. Stiggins, 'all 
taps is vanities.' 

" 'Well,' said Sam, 'I dessay they may be, sir ; but vich 
is your partickler wanity. Vich wanity do you like the flavor 
on best, sir?' 

" ' Oh, my dear young friend,' replied Mr. Stiggins, ' I de- 
spise them all. If,' said Mr. Stiggins, 'if there is any one 
of them less odious than another, it is the liquor called rum 
— warm, my dear young friend, with three lumps of sugar to 
the tumbler.' " — Pickivick Papers, p. 376. 

Fai'ther, the wooden leg alluded to by Mrs. Gamp is an- 
other fine graphic use of the same figure. "As to hus- 
bands," says the monthly nurse, "there's a wooden leg gone 
likewise home to its last account, which for constancy of 
walking into wine-vaults, and never coming out again 'till 
fetched by force, was quite as weak as flesh, if not weaker." 

There is good, strong, humorous painting in the above ex- 
amples, though perhaps the touches are those of the ten- 
pound brush of the scene-painter rather than the delicate 
Shakspearian strokes — the fine sharp lines of the tnie artist. 
Nevertheless, it is preposterous for a class of critics to pre- 
tend that the author of "Pickwick," "David Copperfield," 
and "Martin Chuzzlewit" has no claim to serious considera- 
tion as a writer of fiction. The man who has created Sam 
Weller, Old Weller, Mrs. Gamp, Squeers, Pecksniff, Skim- 
pole, and a host of other beings — that are as real to every 
reader throughout the country as their own friends and ac- 
quaintances, and, indeed, in many cases better, and more in- 
timately known, even, than one's own relatives — is surely 
worthy of all acknowledgment as the Shakspeare of carica- 



THE NEXT TURNING. 2T3 

of our limbs themselves. To the delight of mere 
mental exercise, then, may also be referred the 
.charm that all find in mere change or variety. 
This love of change, indeed, is so marlajed a feat- 
ure in human nature, that it is perhaps the most 
active of all principles within us. It is this which 
in the long succession of ever-shifting scenery, 
characters, and circumstances, constitutes the 
great enjoyment of traveling; this which makes 
th^ revolutions of the seasons, the passage from 
night to day, the ever-varying aspect of nature 
throughout every minute indeed of the same day, 
give such lively beauty to the external world. 
What an exquisite charm, for instance, is there 
in the contemplation of the continued flitting of 
the clouds and the moving shadows upon the 
earth and water ; the bright bursts of sunshine, 

turists. Let the reader mentally contrast the Nurse in "Ro- 
meo and Juliet" with Mrs. Gamp — old Weller with FalstafF 
— his son Sam with the fool in "Lear" — or Pecksniff with 
Malvolio, and he will understand why the distinction is 
drawn. If Mr. Dickens had been but wise enough to eschew 
the fatally-facile trick of sentiment ; if he had never written 
the profound rubbish of "The Chimes," nor the fatuous 
drivel of the "Cricket on the Hearth," nor the Adelphi 
rhodomontade of the "Tale of Two Cities," et id genus, he 
would, beyond doubt, have been as great a literary genius, 
after his kind — as fine a painter of the broadly-marked char- 
acteristics of human life and out-of-the-way places — as En- 
gland has seen for centuries. He, however, has too strong a 
dash of the "real-domestic-drama" blood in his veins to al- 
low himself to do himself even common justice. What is 
true and good in his nature he must forever be marring by 
aflecting what is false and fustian in dramatic art. If he 
had only left the " Terry and Yates" preparatory school, and 
finished his education at the Shakspearian University, as- 
suredly he might have taken honors as a "double first." 
One always feels inclined to say to the indiscriminate ad- 
mirers of such a man what Rousseau told the friends who 
were lauding the ' ' collected edition" of his works to the skies, 
*' Ha ! they should see the books he hadn't written," 
S 



274 TOUJSTG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

and the sudden overshadowing of the land ; the 
endless trooj^ing of the waves on and on toward 
the shore, and the everlasting curling and dash 
of the billows, one after another, upon the beach ; 
the capricious shifting of the swallow's flight, 
forked and swift as lightning ; the ceaseless whirl 
of the wind-mill sails, with their long shadows, 
coursing each other upon the sunny greensward 
below!" 

" Go on, uncle, go on ; I like this very mucR," 
interposed the youth, growing pleased himself 
with the rapid change of thought. 

" The continued pulsing of the water-wheel," 
resumed the old man, " with the white foam of 
the mill-sluice forever tearing along, like a drift- 
ing snow-wreath in the dark shade of the over- 
hanging trees ; the headlong little brook, with the 
water scrambling along its rugged bed, and curl- 
ing like liquid glass about the edges of the op- 
posing rocks and stones ; the waterfall, forever 
descending in long pellucid lines of iridescent 
light, and sheets of the thinnest and purest crys- 
tal, and j^ounding the pool beneath into a mass 
of snow ; the fountain, weaving the water-threads 
into forms of the most exquisite beauty, and curves 
of the softest grace, as it showers its million spark- 
ling jewels into the air and on to the ground ; the 
rich, ripe corn-field undulating in the breeze, as 
if it were a lake of red gold ; the farm-cart, with 
its high-piled load of new-mown hay, surging and 
toppling as the team goes jingling along, rattling 
the bells upon their collars; the mist at early 
morn gradually rising from the earth, like the lift- 
ing of an angel veil ; and the fitful crimson glare 
of the blacksmith's forge, flashing up, with every 
difierent heave of the bellows, in the dusk of a 
winter's evening — all these, and a thousand others, 
derive their natural charms from that principle 



THE NEXT TURNING. 



(u 



which makes change or variety — the change of 
life and action — so grateful to the minds of all. 
Indeed, the mere tedium, Ben, that invariably ac- 
comjoanies any thing bordering on monotony ; the 
overpowering and insufferable weariness of one 
unvarying state of mind when long protracted ; 
of one and the same object ever before the senses ; 
of one eternal note continually sounded in the 
ear, or of one everlasting idea or subject present- 
ed to the imagination, as well as the innate antip- 
athy we have from what is called prosiness, or 
what is 'boring' to us, or even appears 'slow' — 
all this is sufficient to assure us that variation is 
not only a delight, but a positive craving of our 
intellectual nature. It is the intuitive knowledge 
that artists have of the charm afforded by mere 
change, and the tedium induced by monotony, that 
makes painters love to 'break up' long straight 
lines and large masses of color in their pictures, 
and to find picturesqueness in the tumble-down 
and weather-stained old cottages of the peasantry, 
as well as the shaggy coat of the jackass, and the 
jagged lines of rocks and ruins. So, again, in the 
plays of Shakspeare, Ben, the more passionate and 
beautiful speeches and scenes are broken uj) into 
a hundred fragments of different feelings, and 
thus they have not only a wonderful truth to na- 
ture (for strong emotion is ever fitful and discur- 
sive), but display intense art in that fine dramatic 
play and sparkle of the passions which is derived 
from the principle of transition or rapid change.* 

* The illustrations to which Uncle Benjamin more particu- 
larly alludes are the soliloquy beginning, " Oh, that this too, 
too solid flesh would melt" (where one feeling is seldom sus- 
tained for more than five consecutive lines, the entire speech 
being full of disjointed utterances and abrupt digressions, as 
well as parenthetical bursts of some passing passion), and 
the first scene of the third act of " The Merchant of Venice," 
where Tubal brings Shylock news of his runaway daughter, 



276 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

Ah ! when I was a boy, Ben, I would much rather 
have seen the mummers act 'Hamlet' or 'The 
Merchant of Venice' over at Northampton, than 
have had a plum-cake any day. Farther, my boy, 
in the tricks and transformations of conjurors, and 
even in the pantomimes of the mummers, it is the 
curious changes produced that render such ex- 
hibitions so delightful to youth, while in works 
of fiction we are charmed by the rapid succession 
of incident and adventure, and the variety of 
character and scenes presented to the mind. In 
conversation, too, it is the exchange of opinion 
and sentiment, the cross-fire of the diflferent ideas 
and difierent views expressed by the difierent 
characters assembled, the occasionally lively rep- 
artee in answer to some grave remarks, that 
serve to make social intercourse one of the special 
delights of human existence.* Such are a few 

and also of Antonio's loss at sea, and in which the Jew is 
tossed about in a tempest of conflicting emotions ; one mo- 
ment savagely gloating over the details of Antonio's misfor- 
tune, and the next bursting into a phrensy at the particulars 
of his daughter's flight — the transitions from the one feeling 
to the other admitting not only of the finest dramatic ren- 
dering, but glittering with all the richness and lustre of the 
highest art. 

* The great master of every form of literary beauty gives 
a choice instance of the charm we derive from the grouping 
together of a large variety of circumstances in the speech of 
Dame Quickly, when she reminds Sir John Falstaft' of his 
promise to marry her, and cites a number of minute con- 
comitant incidents in order to overwhelm him with the truth 
of her assertion, and prevent the possibility of any pretense 
of oblivion on his part. 

'•'■Falstaff. What is the gross sum I owe thee? 

'■'•Hostess. Marry, if thou wert an honest man, thyself, and 
the money too. Thou didst swear to me upon a parcel-gilt 
goblet, sitting in my Dolphin chamber, at the round table, 
by a sea-coal fire, upon Wednesday in Whitsun-week, when 
the prince broke thy head for liking his father to a singing- 
man of Windsor — thou didst swear to me then, as I was 



THE NEXT TURNING. 277 

of the pleasures of mental exercise, lad ; and you 
will see by-and-by tliat as the irritability of the 

washing thy wound, to many me, and make me * my lady, ' 
thy wife. Canst thou deny it? Did not goodwife Keech, 
the butcher's wife, come in then, and call me Gossip Quickly ? 
coming in to borrow a mess of vinegar ; telling us she had a 
good dish of prawns, whereby thou didst desire to eat some ; 
whereby I told thee they were ill for a green wound ? And 
didst thou not, when she was gone down stairs, desire me to 
be no more so familiarity with such poor people, saying that 
ere long they should call me madam ? And didst thou not 
kiss me, and bid me fetch thee thirty shillings ? I put thee 
now to thy book-oath ; deny it if thou canst." — Second Part 
Henry IV., Act II., Scene 1. 

How beautifully fit, too, are many of these little picturesque 
"surroundings," and how delicately are they thrown in — 
e.g., " the parcel-gilt goblet, " ' ' the Dolphin chamber, " " the 
singing-man of Windsor," "the mess of vinegar," "the dish 
of prawns, whereby thou didst desire to eat some ;" then the 
reference to the "wound" is a fine touch, as is the desire that 
she should be no more so familiarity with such poor people. 
But the grandest stroke of all among t]ie long list of accusa- 
tions lies at the end — so exquisitely true is it to Falstaff's 
character. ' ' Didst thou not kiss me, " adds the dame, ' ' and 
bid me fetch thee thirty shillings?" This is a little morsel 
of artistic humor that has perhaps never been equaled, and 
certainly never transcended. 

How beautifully marked and various again is the group 
of concomitants in Dame Quickly's description of Falstaff's 
death ! 

" 'A made a finer end, and went away, an it had been any 
christom child ; 'a parted even just between twelve and one, 
e'en at the turning of the tide ; for after I saw him fumble 
with the sheets, and play with the flowers, and smile upon 
his fingers' ends, I knew there was but one way ; for his nose 
was as shai-p as a pen, and 'a babbled of green fields." 

Here the ' ' smiling upon the fingers' ends" is a wonderful 
bit of death-painting ; the fumbling with the sheets, too, is 
finely illustrative of the state of mental vacuity at such a 
time ; and when all these exquisitely-artistic associations are 
put together — the christom child — the turning of the tide — the 
sheet-fumbling — the flower-playing — the finger-tip scanning 
— the nose sharp as a pen — and the babbling of green fields^ 
what play is there in the transition from one association to 
the other — and yet what a choice and cunning picture* it is ! 



2T8 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

young muscles naturally sobers down, and the in- 
tellect becomes more and more developed with 

what fine variety in the color — still how soft and sombre the 
coloring ! and, above all, how truthful, and more than truth- 
ful, how typical the tone of the whole ! 

In Rabelais, again, may often be found curious grotesque 
instances of the amusement that is connected with the asso- 
ciation of a number of diverse particulars with one subject, 
though here the charm is more verbal than ideal, e. g. : 

" Master Janotus .... transported himself to the lodging 
of Gargantua, driving before him three red-muzzled beadles, 
and dragged after him five or six artless masters all thor- 
oughly bedraggled Avith the mire of the streets — prattling 
gabblers," proceeds the author, "licorous gluttons, freckled 
bitters (beggars), mangy rascals, lubberly louts, cozening 
foxes, sycophant varlets, scurvy sneaksbies, fondling fops, 
idle lusks, scoffing braggards, jobbernol goosecaps, woodcock 
slangams, noddipeak simpletons." 

But the delight afforded by mere literary variety or change 
in the current of thought is often dexterously brought about 
by Charles Lamb, who was perhaps better skilled in the use 
of the parenthesis than any English writer that ever lived. 
In a true artist's hands, of course, the parenthesis, or even 
that modern off-shoot — the dash — is the means of what land- 
scape painters call "breaking up" lines and masses; it is a 
kind of literary "shunting," as it were, or temporary shift- 
ing of the train of thought on to another line, and, finely 
used, gives the mind one of those slight jogs or jolts that 
serve to Avake up the faculties, and which constitute perhaps 
the chief sense we have of movement in mere passive exer- 
cise. The following example is from Elia's "Complaint as 
to the Deca}^ of Beggars in the Metropolis :" 

"A clerk in the Bank was surprised with the announce- 
ment of a five hundred pound legacy left him by a person 
whose name he was a stranger to. It seems that in his daily 
morning walks from Peckham (or some village thereabouts), 
where he lived, to his office, it had been his practice for the 
last twenty years to drop his halfpenny duly into the hat of 
some blind Bartimeus, that sat begging along by the way- 
side in the Borough. The good old beggar recognized his 
daily benefactor by the voice only; and when he died, left 
all the amassings of his alms (that had been half a century, 
perhaps, in the accumulating) to his old Bank friend. "Was 
this a stoiy to purse up people's hearts and pennies against 
giving an alms to the blind, or not rather a beautiful moral 



THE NEXT TUKNING. 270 

advancing manhood, the athletic sj)ort^ and games 
of youth pass gradually into the mental diversion 

of well-directed charity on the one part, and noble gratitude 
upon the other ? 

"I sometimes wish I had been that Bank clerk. 

" I seem to remember a poor old grateful kind of creature 
blinking, and looking up with his no eyes in the sun. 

" Is it possible I could have steeled my purse against him? 

"Perhaps I had no small change. 

"Reader, do not be frightened at the hard words imposi- 
tion, imposture. Give, and ask no questions: 'Cast thy bread 
upon the waters. ' Some have unawares (like this Bank clerk) 
entertained angels." 

The parenthesis in the last line is set like a jewel with the 
nicest art, serving, as the little hard bit of crystal truth does, 
to assure the mind that the beggar and the angels are some- 
what kin, 

Mr. Dickens, too, often uses the interposed sentence be- 
tween dashes very adroitly. In the following choice little 
bit from the "Pickwick Papers," the interjected sentence is 
not only finely discursive, but so exquisitely suggestive of the 
affected humility of the red-nosed shepherd's character as to 
be an admirable stroke of art. 

" Sam felt very strongly disposed to give the reverend gen- 
tleman something to groan for, but he repressed his inclina- 
tion, and merely asked (with reference to old Mr, Weller), 
'What's the old 'un been up to now?' 

" 'Up to, indeed!' said Mrs. Weller; 'oh, he has a hard 
heart. Night after night does this excellent man — don't 
frozen, Mr. Stiggins ; I will say you are an excellent man — 
come and sit here for hours together, and it has not the least 
effect upon him.' " — Pickivick Papers, p. 218. 

Again, the little domestic interpolation as to the price of 
red kidney potatoes, in the evidence of Mrs. Cluppins, in the 
celebrated trial-scene of the same unctuous book, is a very 
happy touch, admirably characteristic as it is of the house- 
wife, and yet deliciously comic fi'om the very inappropriate- 
ness of the piece of household information conveyed to "my 
lord and jury" by the lady, who found such difficulty in 
"composing herself" on her entry into the witness-box. 

" 'What were you doing in the back room, ma'am?' in- 
quired the little judge. 

" ' My lord and jury,' said Mrs. Cluppins, with interesting 
agitation, 'I will not deceive you.' 

" ' You had better not, ma'am,' said the little judge. 



280 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

of books, Aeditation, and converse; nevertheless, 
it is still the same love of exercise that makes the 
occupation delightful in both cases, for it is this 
which gives its special charm not only to the 
physical pastime, but to the intellectual amuse- 
ment as well." 

THE PLEASTTEES OF MENTAL EXCITEMENT. 

"What are you going to do next, uncle?" 
asked little Ben. 

" Why, next we have to explain the pleasures 
of mental excitement," was the answer. 

" But, uncle, you did the pleasures of ease and 
satisfaction after the pleasures of exercise last 
time," suggested the lad, *' and why don't you go 
on as you began ?" 

" Because, Ben, here the one subject naturally 
passes into the other," returned Uncle Benjamin, 
" and in the other case it did not. You see, the 
love of change — the love of those gentle and 
gradual transitions of mind (which are all that is 
meant by the term mental exercise) is intimately 
connected with the pleasure that we derive from 
the more violent alterations in the natural course 
of our thoughts, and such violent alterations are 
mainly concerned in producing that state which 
is called ' inental excitement.' Indeed, excitement 
is but an exaggerated form of exercise in the 
mind, and, intellectually speaking, requires only 
an exaggerated form of the same conditions to 
produce it. Ordinary change merely exercises 
the mind, but extraordinary transition, you will 
find, inordinately excites it. To produce that 

" ' I was there, ' resumed Mrs. Cluppins, ' onbekno^^^l to 
Mrs. Bardell. I had been out with a little basket, gentle- 
men, to buy three pound of red kidney purtaties — ivhich teas 
ih^ee pound tuppence ha'penny — when I see Mrs. Bardell's 
Street-door on the jar.' " — Pickwick Papers, p. 283. 



THE NEXT TUENING. 281 

change or play of thought which constitutes men- 
tal exercise, nothing but a succession of slightly 
different perceptions is necessary; but to throw 
the mind into a state of excitement intellectually, 
it is essential that some widely different impres- 
sion, or even one that is diametrically opposite 
from our previous expectations, should be made 
upon us. Indeed, the difference must be so mark- 
ed as to produce a startling effect upon us ; and 
it is the love of these startling effects, and the 
pleasure we derive from the extra-vividness of 
the impressions produced by them, which consti- 
tutes the great charm that many find in the prin- 
ciple of mental excitement. The delight, for ex- 
ample, that is felt in contemplating — at a distance 
— the extraordinary phenomena of nature — the 
grandeur of the wild rage of the storm ; the con- 
vulsive throes of the heaving earthquake; the 
mighty fountain of fire poured forth by the burn- 
ing volcano, and the crimson cascades of liquid 
lava streaming, like the earth's hot blood, down 
the mountain sides ; the jew^eled stalactite caverns 
of the world, their roofs glittering with their deep 
fringe of pendent crystals, as though they were 
huge petrified icicles ; the giant caves, with their 
monster columnar rocks, that are like the council- 
halls of devils ; the immense icebergs floating in 
the arctic seas, and lurking there, like tremendous 
white bears, ready to crush the bones of any stray 
vessel that may chance to fall within their ada- 
mantine grip ; the thick daylight-darkness of the 
eclipse, that affrights the cattle in the fields ; the 
ominous-looking fire-mist of the comet ; the flam- 
ing dart of the falling star, that seems to streak 
the heavens with a line of fire as it descends ; the 
never-ending flood of the cataract, with its flashes 
of silver lightning and roar of liquid thunder — 
these are the natural stimulants of the innate 



282 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

wonder of our souls, and which, awful as they 
may seem in all the terror of their reality, yet 
become the grandest and loveliest objects when 
ideally regarded by us. It is the same mental 
propensity that leads the more sluggish intellect- 
ual natures among mankind to find delight in 
those gross monstrosities, and Avild freaks of na- 
ture, which are usually found in shows at fairs, 
and which act as drams upon the languid current 
of thought and imagination among the vulgar. 
Again, it is the natural delight of man in wonders 
and marvels that makes us all, more or less, have 
a trace of the grandmother and the child forever 
stamped upon our mind; finding, as we do, a 
strange winsomeness in those nursery tales of 
giants and ogres, fairies and pixies, hobgobhns 
and bogies, that we hear almost in our cradle, 
as well as in those mystic stories of ghosts and 
death-fetches, presentiments, omens, and witch- 
ery, which are only the hazy foreshadowings of 
that strange supernatural life and sense which we 
must carry with us to our grave." 

" How beautiful it is, uncle ! Do you know, I 
fancy I can just begin to see now a little bit into 
my own nature ?" exclaimed the boy, in a more 
serious tone than he had yet spoken. 

" There is but little light yet, Ben," returned 
the old man. " At best, we are but prisoners in a 
dark dungeon, and we must look, and look for a 
long time into our own souls, before we can dis- 
cern any thing in the obscurity. Still, with long- 
looking, the mental eye becomes at last acclimated 
as it were to the darkness, and begins to make out 
first one little object, and then another. But we 
want the light of heaven, lad — the light of heaven! 
— to illuminate the insect before even the highest 
microscopic vision can see it clearly. We mustn't 
wander, however, from our purpose. iN'ow not 



THE NEXT TFENING. 283 

only does our love of extra-vivid impressions, Ben, 
make us find delight in the marvelous as well as 
in the wonders of the world, and also in the ex- 
traordinary, or even strange phenomena of nature, 
but it causes us likewise to derive a special pleas- 
ure from the astonishing and surprising events 
and objects in life, nature, and art too. When any 
thing occurs or is i^resented to us that is entirely 
different from what we have expected, we are as- 
tonished / and when it comes upon us utterly un- 
expected, we are siirp7'isecL If any one, for ex- 
ample, were to come behind you at this moment 
in the dark" — and, as the uncle said the words, 
the boy looked round half frightened, so as to as- 
sure himself that there was no possibility of such 
an event occurring to him — "and to seize you 
suddenly by the nape of the neck, you would ex- 
perience a sensation something like to an electric 
shock all through your frame, and which would 
convulse for the moment every limb in your body. 
And then, if you were to turn round and discover 
that it was only brother Nehemiah or Jabez, aft- 
er all, who had found out where you were, and 
crept softly up to you, so as to have a bit of fun 
with you, why then, lad, the alarm would cease in 
an instant, and you Avould fall to laughing at what 
is termed the ' agreeable suTX^rise^ you had expe- 
rienced." 

The little fellow, indeed, smiled at the mere im- 
aginatio]|j|of such an incident occurring to him. 

" Again, if you were to go over to England, say, 
and suddenly discover, in the person of the lord- 
mayor of London, let us suppose, your own long- 
lost brother Josiah, who ran away to sea in oppo- 
sition to his father's will, why then, of course, you 
would be mightily and agreeably astonished to 
find the outcast, who, you fancy, is now leading a 
half-savage life somewhere in the backwoods, had 



284 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

become transmogrified* into the first civic func- 
tionary of the first city in the world." 

" So I should, of course," interjected the lad. 

" N'ow these feelings of surprise and astonish- 
ment, Ben," the uncle went on, " are feelings that 
serve to give intense vividness to the objects or 
circumstances which produce them ; that is to say, 
they throw the mind into a state of violent ex- 
citement for a time, which is very different from 
the gentle stimulus produced by the mere exer- 
cise of it, and this violent excitement, of course, 
tends to impress the causes of the emotion with 
increased force upon the brain. They are true 
mental stimulants suddenly giving increased vig- 
or to all the faculties and sensibilities of our na- 
ture — like Avine, or even opium — and if indulged 
in to excess, they tend at last, like the physical 
stimulants themselves, to enfeeble rather than 
strengthen the natural powers. Thus, then, we 
come at the reason why the highly-spiced works 
of fiction and the tricky dramas of the stage 
(though it's many a long year now since I saw 
any of them) are filled with extravagant incidents 
and startling surprises, as well as such extraordi- 
nary characters as are the mere caricatures of hu- 
man frivolities and singularities rather than types 
of human passion. These productions are not 
only contemptible as works of art, but baneful to 
healthy mental digestion — that digestion which is 
wanted to exert itself upon less fiery |^nd more 
solid food, and has often to put up with the dry 
and hard cud of philosophy, which requires to be 

* The young reader should be warned that the common 
colloquial expression here made use of by Uncle Benjamin 
is a vulgarism. A little reflection will show that there is no 
such root as '■'■mogrifY' existing in any language. The term 
is evidently an ignorant corruption of the word ^^transmod- 
ify^'"" to change the viode^ or form of a thing. 



THE NEXT TURNING. 285 

chewed over and over again, lad, before it can be 
swallowed — such romantic trash, I say, is as det- 
rimental to sound taste and mental sanity as your 
hot peppers, sharp sauces, and your drops of raw 
spirits are destructive of the natural functions of 
the stomach. Nevertheless, lad, though the feel- 
ings of surprise and astonishment go to make up 
the glitter and finery of trashy and extravagant 
art, they are, after all, in a subdued form, the 
great enliveners of mental existence, and serve to 
add the finishing stroke, when touched with true 
artistic delicacy, to all works and objects of high 
beauty. They give, as it were, that gloss and 
lustre of varnish to the picture which brings out 
all the colors with finer force — the polish and 
sparkle of many facets to the jewels — the sunhght 
that at once brightens and warms up the land- 
scape. The feeling of admiration, indeed, which 
all true beauty inspires, has so much of wonder 
and astonishment in its nature, that one can not 
but feel that the loveliness, even of perfection it- 
self, would be only a kind of platonic loveliness if 
it did not at once astonish us with its transcend- 
ent grace, and set us wondering at the marvel- 
ousness of its consummate excellence. The beau- 
ty of nature and high art has always something 
extraordinary about it. Though we have looked 
upon the magnificent glory of the clouds, and 
gazed upon the very sumptuousness of gold and 
crimson with which the sun drapes the heavens 
and tints the air at morning and evening some 
hundreds of times in our lives, yet there is noth- 
ing old and familiar about the sight : the grand- 
eur of to-day is not the worn-out grandeur of yes- 
terday ; for the scene is still so entirely novel in 
the grouping of the forms of the clouds, the splen- 
dor and tone of the colors, and the very tint of 
the pinky light itself, that we can not but wonder 



286 YOUNG BEXJAMIN FKAXKLIN. 

and woncler on, day after day, even till we gaze 
at it for the last time of all. So, too, with the 
works of high art. It is the peculiar quality of 
all force, lad, that there is no principle of decay in 
it (a ball once made to move would keep moving 
on to all eternity, Ben, if there were nothing to 
stop it), and it is the same with the force of im- 
mortal genius. It is at once self-sustaining and 
indestructible. A truly grand work is young, 
fresh, and vigorous to the end of all tune. Study 
it never so often — scan it till the mind seems to 
know every fragment of it as well as the mother 
knows every little lineament of her infant's face, 
and yet come to it again, and a new world of 
beauty and wonder will still burst out once more 
from the well-thumbed page or old familiar can- 
vas, even as that mother can see the well-scanned 
face of her infant light uj) with a new expression 
with each new smile. 

Young Ben was mute with the contemplation 
naturally begotten by the charm of his uncle's 
theme, and he sat thinking in silence of the great 
books he had read over and over again — of old 
John Bunyan's "Pilgrim's Progress," and But- 
ler's " Hudibras," and Milton's mighty epic, and 
Shakspeare's wondrous plays (Uncle Ben had had 
a hard fight with Josiah to allow the boy to read 
the plays), and, last of all, of De Foe's simple 
" Robinson Crusoe" — and thinking, too, how 
strange it was that he should never tire of read- 
ing tfiem^ while there were others at which he 
could not look, after he had had his fill of the 
mere story contained in them, even though his 
mind had traveled never so pleasantly over the 
pages at the time. 

"In wit as well as beauty," added the old man, 
" it is ; he gay surprise, the happy astonishment 
begotten by the unexpectedness of the lively rep- 



THE NEXT TURNING. £87 

artee or sally — of the quaint idea or odd simile — 
or of the choice grotesque expression that tickles, 
while it startles us with the novelty, and yet with 
the queerness and aptness of the thought.* In 

* That curious style of " funniment, " called Americanisms, 
also depends upon the pleasure the mind finds in extremes 
for the greater part of its amusement. For instance, when 
we are told that "there is a nigger woman in South Caro- 
lina who has a child so black that charcoal makes a white 
mark upon it," the fancy is carried almost to the very verge 
of common sense, and the effect produced is a vain endeavor 
to comprehend the incomprehensible, in connection with a 
mean instead of a grand idea — the same as if we were trying 
to realize a funny infinity. Again, the peculiar blunders 
called '■'■ hulls" are funny to us, because the mind contrasts 
the meaning with the sense expressed ; as, for example, when 
we are told that an Irish gentleman had a small room full 
of pictures, which he was about to show to a number of his 
friends at the same time, but on finding that they all made 
a rush to the door at once, he cried out, as he endeavored to 
restrain the more impatient, "Faith, gintlemin, if ye will go 
in together, it'll nivir hould the half of ye :" here we know 
well enough what the Irish gentleman meant, but this is so 
different from what he really said, and the contradiction of 
all his guests going into a room that wouldn't hold half of 
them — all this is so marked that it is impossible not to laugh 
at the inconsistency under such circumstances. Farther, 
there are the verbal blunders — those odd mistakes of words 
— which are styled "Malapropisms," after Sheridan's cele- 
brated character in "The Rivals." It is this form of wit 
which delights us so much with the letters of Winifred Jen- 
kins, by Smollett, or those of Mrs. Ramsbottom by Theodore 
Hook, and others by Thomas Hood ; for who can help smil- 
ing when they hear an old citizen extol the virtues of ' ' in- 
dustry, perseverance, and acidity," or a vulgar old dame 
declare that a bright, dry winter's day is " fine embracing 
weather?" Moreover, there are the inconsistencies of those 
intentional mistakes which belong to the class of " Anach- 
ronisms," and where the small modicum of fun lies, as in 
our modern burlesques, in putting Minerva into blue stock- 
ings and blue spectacles, and giving Mars a shell jacket and 
Piccadilly whiskers, or making Diana smoke cigars and talk 
slang ; or else it is expressed in that strange and ingenious 
nonsense which consists of a kind of anachronous farago, 



288 TOUNa BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

the anecdote of the dull and prosy clergyman, who 
was reproving his flock for their habit of going to 
sleep during the sermon, and who sought to shame 
them by reminding them that even Jimmy, the 
wretched idiot in the free seats, could keep him- 
self awake ; whereujDon a wag returned that ' if 
Jimmy hadn't been a wretched idiot, he would 
have been asleep too' — in this anecdote, of course, 
it is the unexpectedness of the retort — the sharp 
backward cut of the foil, that startles us as much 
as any thing. So, too, in that pinchbeck kind of 
wit called punning, we are taken aback by the 
double meaning of the term on which the pun is 

where the several events of history have been, as it were, 
rattled together in some droll kaleidoscopic fancy, and made 
to tumble into the queerest possible forms. Akin to these 
intentional anachronisms, or "cross-times," as it were, are 
the "cross-readings," or those curious jumbles of sense that 
either startle us to laughter with the oddness of the ideas 
that are thus brought into juxtaposition, or else set us won- 
dering at the ingenuity of the arrangement. There are a 
few specimens of this form of fun preserved in the '■'■Neio 
Foundling Hospital for TF^7," the principal of which are ex- 
tracts from the old '■'■ Public Advertizer,^^ and the drollery of 
which consists in the odd associations that are frequently 
brought about by reading a newspaper across two adjoining 
columns rather than down each column singly in the usual 
manner, e. g. : 

Lastnightthe Princess Royal was baptized— Mary a7ta»MollHackett,a?iajBlackMoll. 
Yesterday the new L'd-mayor-svas sworn in — afterward tossed and gored several persons. 

Again, in the double letter attributed to Cardinal Riche- 
lieu (which, when read in single columns, expresses one 
sense, and when read across has a totally different significa- 
tion), there is enough art to make us mai-vel at the skill, and 
yet such a sense of labor with it all, that our admiration is 
alloyed with the idea that it was hardly worth while taking 
such pains, as the author must, to compass so trifling an end, 
to wit : 

Sir,— 

Mons. Compeigne, a Savoyard by birth, a Friar of the order of St. Benedict, 

is tl.e man who will present to you as his passport to your protection, 

this letter. He is one of the most discreet, the wisest, and the least 

meddling persons I have ever known, or have had the pleasure to converse with, 
etc. etc. etc. etc. etc, etc. 



THE NEXT TURNING. 289 

made, and thus pleasantly startled again by the 
use of the word in a different sense from what we 
expected. When King Charles the Second, for 
instance, bade Rochester make a joke, and Roches- 
ter asked the monarch to name a subject, the 
ready reply of the wit, on the king's naming him- 
self, that his majesty could not possibly be a " 5w5- 
Jec^," startles us slightly, when we first hear it, 
from the widely different sense given to the word 
subject itself Moreover, it is to the vivid impres- 
sions produced by widely different and diametric- 
ally opposite ideas and objects, when made to 
succeed one another immediately in the mind, that 
such lively delight is found in the principle of con- 
trast, as I before explained to you, lad, though then 
I enforced upon you the charms that belong prin- 
cipally to contrasted physical objects. In art, 
however, the extremes of contrast are often ef- 
fective for a while, though your mere black and 
white style of painting generally belongs to that 
coarser kind of eftect which is requisite to enliven 
duller perceptions and tastes. The figure of an- 
tithesis, nevertheless, is always brilliant in literary 
composition ; for there is a natural sparkle in the 
collocation of any two directly opposite ideas, as, 
for instance, in the two terms of life — the cradle 
and the grave ; the two extremes of human emo- 
tions — smiles and tears; the two opposite types of 
wealth and want — Dives and Lazarus; of worldly 
power and helplessness — the monarch and the 
slave.* Again, as the high lights of a picture are 
always in the foreground, and the greatest depth 
of shade to be found there too, so even Shakspeare 
himself often resorts to the principle of contrast 
to throw up the brilliances of some of his fore- 

* The delight that some find in paradoxes, and even in 
what the vulgar ivill call ^^ contrayriness,^' maybe referred to 
the same principle. 

T 



290 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

most characters. Thus, in ' Romeo and Jnliet,' 
the old nurse is an exquisite foil to bring out all 
the lustre and richness of the young, ripe love of 
Juliet ; and even in the contemplativeness of the 
old friar, sworn to cehbacy and the life of an as- 
cetic, and yet who is sufficiently human to delight 
in matrimony and the beautiful world about him, 
what a charming set-off have we to the hot-blood- 
ed young Romeo, now moody in woods, and now 
burning with the flame of his first real passion ; 
and what a lively relief, again, is the merry and 
voluble light-heartedness of the fairy-spirited Mer- 
cutio even to Romeo himself! Moreover, in ' Lear,' 
what exquisite contrasted force is there in those 
extremes of demention — the two opposite and 
widely distant verges of mental eccentricity — 
shown in the wild madness of the king and the 
cunning foolery of the fool ! And so in ' Hamlet' 
Ave have the touching and tender madness of the 
young, broken-hearted girl, as depicted in Ophe- 
lia, contrasted with the ' insanity of purpose' — the 
mental wandering and vacillation of a weak and 
noble nature — exemplified in Hamlet himself. 
The grave-scene, too, in the same play, is resplen- 
dent with the same brilliance of contrasted idio- 
syncrasies ; for here we have the quaint logical 
merriment of the old grave-digger played off 
against the fine philosophic utterances of the 
young Danish prince — all these are sufficient to 
show you, lad, that the principle of contrast, when 
nicely and skillfully handled, can lend some of its 
highest and most lustrous beauties to the picture. 
And with that ends the list of the chief pleasures 
that arise from mental excitement, my son."* 

* The best example of the literary glitter produced by the 
figure of contrast is, so far as we know, the collocation of the 
wonders revealed by the telescope and microscope, penned 
by Dr. Chalmers, and which is certainly a brilliant instance 



THE NEXT TUENING. 291 

THE PLEASURES OF MENTAL SATISFACTION. 

" And now you're going to do the pleasures of 
mental satisfaction, ain't you, uncle?" asked the 
boy. 

of its kind. There is perhaps a leetle too much art apparent 
in the balance of the sentences, and continued vibration of 
the mind from the infinitely great to the infinitely small, 
and perhaps it is just a taste too saccharine to fully satisfy 
the highly educated palate. Nevertheless, as an illustra- 
tion of the charms of this rhetorical form, it is at once signal 
and salient. 

"The one led me to see a system in every star; the other 
leads me to see a world in every atom. The one taught me 
that this mighty globe, with the whole burden of its people 
and of its countries, is but a grain of sand on the high field 
of immensity ; the other teaches me that every grain of sand 
may harbor within it the tribes and the families of a busy 
population. The one told me of the insignificance of the 
world I tread upon ; the other redeems it from all its insig- 
nificance, for it tells me that in the leaves of every forest, 
and in the flowers of every garden, and in the waters of 
every rivulet, there are worlds teeming with life, and num- 
berless as are the glories of the firmament. The one has 
suggested to me that beyond and above all that is visible to 
man there may be fields of creation which sweep immeasur- 
ably along, and carry the impress of the Almighty's hand to 
the remotest scenes of the universe ; the other suggests to 
me that within and beneath all that minuteness which the 
aided eye of man has been able to explore, there may be a 
region of invisibles ; and that, could we draw aside the mys- 
terious curtain which shrouds it from our senses, we might 
there see a theatre of as many wonders as astronomy has un- 
folded — a universe within the compass of a point so small 
as to elude all the powers of the microscope, but where the 
wonder-working God finds room for the exercise of all his 
attributes — where He can raise another mechanism of worlds, 
and fill and animate them with all the evidences of his 
glory." 

The only fault here, we repeat, is the obviousness of the 
art {'■'■ars est celare artevi''), so that the reader is led to see 
the trick, as it were, by which the eflPect is produced. The 
fairy piece which enchants us from the front of the theatre 
is but poor tawdry clumsy work viewed from behind the 
scenes, and hence the verses of Pope and Tommy Moore, 



292 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" Yes, lad," was the answer ; " for the consid- 
eration of the love of change, inherent in our 

exquisitely artistic as they are, become mere elaborations of 
wit rather than flashes of true poetic fire — choice specimens 
of mental handicraft from the very excess of art that has 
been wasted upon them, rather than those fine facile crea- 
tions which precede rule instead of following it ; so that to 
pass from the dead level of the perfect polish of such work 
to the rich, rough, and forcible fervor of true poetic genius, 
as shown in Shakspeare, is the same as shifting the mind 
from the contemplation of mere filigree-work to the stu- 
pendous acliievements of modern engineering — from look- 
ing at a Berlin bracelet in spun cast-iron to the massive 
grandeur of the tubular bridge or the dizzy triumph of the 
"um 7rta/a." 

But if the quotation from Dr. Chalmers is hardly a perfect 
specimen of this form of literary beauty, because the artistry 
of it is just a shade too marked, what can be said of the 
following extract, where we have not a scintilla of beauty, 
but merely clap-trap artifice and extravagance instead? 
Here the form which, with a person of true taste, can be 
made to yield such exquisite delight, becomes positively ugly 
as an oilman's shop front from the patchwork of glaring 
colors in which it is tricked out. The efiect is consequently 
merely "loud," not "tasty;" and that black and white, 
which in a Rembrandt's etching is a world of beauty, be- 
comes as vulgar and inartistic as the sign of the " Checkers" 
on a public house door. 

' ' It was the best 0/ times ; it was the worst of times ; it was 
tire ac/e of ivisdom ; it was the age of foolishness ; it was the 
epoch of belief; it was the epoch of incredulity ; it was the 
season of light ; it Avas the season of darkness ; it was the 
spring of hope ; it was the icinter of despair ; we had every 
thing before us ; we had nothing before us ; we were all going 
direct to heaven ; we \fere all going direct the other ivay ; in 
short, the period was so far like the present period that some 
of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for 
good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison 
only." — Tale of Two Cities. 

Such fatal blemishes as the above are really like rash at- 
tempts at literary suicide in a man who has no necessity to 
stoop to trick to produce an impression. But who can for- 
get the wretched "artful dodges" of "the kettle began it;" 
no, "the cricket began it," in the " Cricket on the Hearth," 
and the raving melodramatic rubbish of "up, up, up," and 



THE NEXT TURNING. 293 

mental nature, cleared the way for the explana- 
tion of our delight in those vivid impressions 

''down, down, down," and "round, round, round," in the 
"Chimes?" Such overdoing as this surely "can not but 
make the judicious grieve." 

Now compare the crudity of the above piece of verbal 
trickery with the high polish and sparkle of the following 
bit of elegant artifice from Sheridan's wonderful elaboration 
of wit, "jTAe School for Scandal.'^ It will be seen that it 
is still the contrasted figure of speech that gives the fine 
relish to the subjoined dainty morsel of literary luxury ; and 
though it has all the studied artificiality of wit, and wants 
the honest geniality of delicate humor to give it the true 
ring of spontaneous rather than affected merriment, never- 
theless, it must be confessed that the play and oscillation of 
the antithesis is kept up in a masterly manner, and that the 
whim vibrates as airily and elegantly as a shuttlecock be- 
tween the battledores in skillful hands. 

" Sir Peter Teazle. — When an old bachelor marries a 
yoimg wife, what is he to expect? 'Tis now six months 
since Lady Teazle made me the hajipiest of men, and I have 
been the most miserable dog ever since ! We lift a little 
going to church, and fairly quarreled before the bells had done 
7'inging. I was more than once nearly choked with gall 
during the honeymoon, and had lost all comfort in life before 
my friends had done Avishing me joy. Yet I chose with 
caution — a girl bred ivholly in the country, who never knew 
luxury beyond one silk gown, nor dissipation above the an- 
nual gala of a race-ball, though she now plays her part in 
all the extravagant fopperies of fashion and the toivn with as 
ready a grace as if she never had seen a bush or grass-plot 
out of Gro^-enor Square T^ — School for Scandal, Act I., 
Scene 2. 

The "luxury" of the "one silk gown," and the "dissipa- 
tion" of the "annual gala of the race-ball," as well as the 
"bush or grass-plot out of Grosvenor Square," are nice del-r 
icate touches of wit, though out of the contrasted form. 

As another illustration of the contrary form of wit, we 
may cite those paradoxical maxims which startle us with 
their opposition to common opinion, and yet with their 
truthfulness to a certain kind of debased nature, as, for in- 
stance, when Rouchefoucauld defines gi-atitude to be "a live- 
ly expectation of favors to come,^^ and Talleyrand explains 
speech to be the faculty given to man as the means of con- 
cealing his real thoughts and* feelings. 



2W YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

which are connected with states of mental excite- 
ment, and the understanding of the latter subject 
has, in its turn, fitted us, in a measure, for the due 
comprehension of the charms which spring from 
our instinctive longing for a state of mental ease. 
Before we can desire or feel the delights of ease, 
however, we must exist in some state of uneasi- 
ness. Rest and repose are pleasurable to us only 
after violent exertion and consequent fatigue, even 
as exercise itself is especially charming after long 
rest and consequent tedium. So, again, before we 
can feel satisfied, we must have hungered ; there 
must have been a precedent craving in order to 
enjoy that thorough contentment of soul which 
is a necessary consequence of the perfect appease- 
ment of the previous longing. We must there- 
fore, Ben, set about discovering what this state 
of mental uneasiness is, that corresponds with the 
bodily uneasiness of appetite, as well as with the 
wearisomeness of physical fatigue ; we must do 
this before we can get thoroughly down to the 
source of the delight which comes from the allay- 
ing of the uneasy feeling. Now, though we are 
gladdened by change, or slight difierences, and 
agreeably astonished by the perception oi extreme 
differences among things, we are, on the other 
hand, disgusted by any mere heterogeneous chaos 
or confused tangle of ideas and objects. The 
transitions from one state of mind to the other, 
which make us so delighted with change and va- 
riety, must, in order to delight us, be essentially 
rhythmical^ as it were ; that is to say, there must 
be a mellifluence, or nice gradation about it, or 
else it would not correspond with that series of 
gentle and congenial muscular actions w^hich is 
termed physical exercise. Again, the inordinate 
vividness of the impressions, which causes us to 
find so much mental pleasure in the more aston- 



THE NEXT TURNING. 295 

ishing phenomena of nature, is pleasurable prin- 
cipally because this same inordinate vividness 
serves, as it were, to let in a sudden burst of hght 
upon the brain, and so to render the astonishing 
objects themselves more distinct than they would 
otherwise be to our hazy perceptions. But, 
though those things, which are extremely differ- 
ent, thus become extremely distinct when pre- 
sented to the mind with all the force of colloca- 
tion and consequent astonishment, nevertheless 
such things as are utterly heterogeneous in nature 
— that is to say, totally separate and disjointed — 
are merely rendered indistinct and confused when 
juxtaposited ; and thus, instead of gaining extra 
light from the juxtaposition, they really appear 
even more confounded than they naturally are, 
and so become more obscure, while the increase 
of the natural obscurity serves to make such per- 
ceptions as hateful to us as darkness itself. There 
must be some principle of coherence, lad — some 
slight thread on which to string the beads of our 
thoughts and perceptions — some fine connecting 
bond of common sense to unite the series, other- 
wise the irrelevant sequence has all the incompre- 
hensibility of nonsense, and the wild chaos of 
ideas all the incoherence of madness; than which, 
perhaps, there is nothing so maddening to attend 
to. True mental uneasiness, then, springs from 
that state of perplexity and bewilderment, that 
sense of confoundedness and distractedness of 
mind, which we experience whenever the thoughts 
appear to run wild, as it were, and to crowd upon 
the brain with all the inconsequence of delirium, 
and all the disorder and unconnectedness oiover- 
excitement or phrensy. Thus, lad, you perceive 
by what fine shades and gradations the rainbow 
hues of the emotions pass into one another. A 
slight difference or change produces the pleasur- 



296 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

able feeling of mental exercise. A wide and 
marked difference or contrast occasions the live- 
lier pleasure of mental excitement, whereas total 
dissimilarity and disconnection give rise to o^;er- 
excitement and that consequent uneasy state 
which is termed mental perplexity or bewilder- 
ment." 

/' Yes, I can see it as you explain it now," ejac- 
ulated the youth. 

" Well, it is often the case, Ben, when any 
thing very extraordinary is presented to the mind, 
that the astonishment occasioned by the percep- 
tion of it is succeeded by a state of iconder^ and 
this is literally the dwelling or fond and lovely 
lingering of the soul over the object which has 
excited its admiration.* But this tendency to 
linger over the admirable and extraordinary nat- 
urally sets the intellect speculating as to the cause 
or special excellence of the rare event or object 
before us ; and then, if the wonder can not be sat- 
isfied, if the marvel can not be explained, if the 
rarity be utterly unlike any thing ever seen be- 
fore, and there be no apparent means of learning 
whence it came, or how it happened, or to what 
type it belongs, then, I say, such a veil of mystery 
seems to us to envelop it, and such a jostling 
crowd of idle speculations concerning it keep 
rushing into the brain — such a chaos of incoher- 
ent conjectures at once encumber and confound 
the reason, that as the mind attends to one vague 

* The primitive meaning of the Latin root viiror in advii- 
ratio is to be found in the Armoric word Mirez, to hold, stop^ 
dwell ; and whence comes the Fr. Demeurer^ and our Demu7\ 
and Moor (as a ship). So the Anglo-Saxon Wondrian, to 
wonder, is connected with our old English word to ivone, to 
dwell (Sax. Wennan); and Wont, custom. The primary 
sense of astonishment, on the other hand, is that stunning of 
the mind which is produced by any loud noise or diiiy such as 
thunder and other astounding phenomena. 



THE NEXT TURNING. 29T 

surmise after another, and still finds no clew to 
the tangle, no resting-place in the wilderness, and 
sees not a solitary star-speck of light glimmering 
through the darkness of the clouds — why then 
the wonder-stricken are lost in a worrying maze 
of bewilderment, as it is called, and grow restless 
under the uneasiness of the perplexity that fetters 
their understanding, while they are devoured by 
a positive craving of curiosity that keeps gnaw- 
ing and gnawing at the soul, like the eagle at the 
heart of poor struggling Prometheus chained to 
the rock. The mental action which accompanies 
a state of perplexity, then, you will perceive, lad, 
is essentially different from the movement of the 
mind in a state of exercise : in the latter state the 
thoughts flow naturally and steadily onward, but 
in perplexity there is no advance, but merely that 
mental oscillation or vacillation — that continued 
shifting backward and forward, to and from the 
perplexing object, which is always connected with 
doubt and distraction. It is this protracted flut- 
ter of the mind, this unpleasant palpitation of the 
soul, as it were, this spasmodic throb of thought 
in the state of doubt that makes the feeling so 
distressing to us all, and which gives it its princi- 
pal uneasiness, while the uneasiness itself excites 
in us the same yearning and gnawing as a bodily 
craving to appease it. It is, indeed, a mental ap- 
petite, that hunger of the intellect for some object 
that will satisfy it ; that yearning for knowledge 
and enlightenment, which is termed curiosity 
when stirred by the more trivial riddles and puz- 
zles of life, and philosophy when moved by the 
great mysteries of nature itself. Hence you can 
easily understand, lad, that whatever serves to al- 
lay the great intellectual want of our minds be- 
comes as palatable to our brain as even food or 
drink to the hungering or thirsting body — ay, 



29S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

and it leaves behind it the same sense of satisfac- 
tion and contentment as we feel when the bodily 
appetite is thoroughly appeased. Any thing, 
therefore, which tends to clear up our doubts ; to 
unravel, be it never so little, the tangled skein of 
circumstances encompassing our lives — to give us 
the least enlightenment in the pitchy darkness of 
the world's mysteries, is as delightful and com- 
forting to the bewildered and troubled intellect 
as the allaying of bodily anguish and bodily fa- 
tigue, for it brings sweet relief to the aching 
brain, blessed mental rest to the mentally weary." 

" Strange, isn't it, uncle, that there should be 
the same appetites in our mind as there are in our 
body," remarked the little fellow, " and that we 
should feel the same want for knowledge as we 
do for food!" 

The old man scarcely heard the boy's remark, 
however, for he was too much absorbed in his 
subject to be diverted from the continuity of his 
own thoughts ; so on he went : " Now it is the 
delight and soothing repose of the soul that we 
feel in states of mental satisfaction that is the 
main cause of the transcendent charms we find in 
the contemplation of perfection itself: a perfect 
circle even, for instance ; a perfect crystal with- 
out flaw or speck ; a perfect face, with all the 
features in due proportion, finely chiseled, and 
radiant at once with health, cheerfulness, intelli- 
gence, and kindness ; a perfect human form, ex- 
quisitely modeled, perfect in its symmetry and 
the fine flowing outline of the limbs, and perfect 
in the grace of its gestures, and the lithesome 
ease of its actions ; or, indeed, a perfect any thing, 
even up to the one transcendent Perfection — the 
perfection of all perfection — God himself In- 
deed, not only does the feeling of perfect mental 
satisfaction give rise to the pleasure we find in 



THE NEXT TUENING. 200 

perfection of all kinds, and hence lie at the very 
root of our love of beauty, but it is evident that 
we never feel mentally satisfied with any thing so 
long as we can discover any imperfection, any de- 
fect or blemish in it; and the dissatisfaction we 
feel at the perception of any defect or blemish is 
a state of mental uneasiness that greatly annoys 
and iiTitates the mind. Even a button off a coat 
is particularly vexing to the eye ; a thing out of 
straight, out of square, or out of truth, as car- 
penters say ; a book with a page of the text torn 
out ; a set of some great author's works wanting 
one volume, and so on — these are things that it 
is impossible to be pleased with, and that simply 
because the mind can not exist in a state of satis- 
faction and contentment so long as the sense of 
the want is impressed upon it. There must be 
absolute integrity of all the parts, otherwise the 
detection of the smallest deficiency will be sure 
to change the beauty into an ugliness, the para- 
gon into a deformity ; for deformity itself is only 
an excessive variation from that type which is 
considered to be the perfect form of things. So, 
again, we delight in any thing which seems to 
give us that perfect understanding, or grasp of 
all the parts, or thorough sense of a subject which 
is called the comprehension of it ; even as, on the 
contrary, we hate what conveys no sense at all 
to us, or, in other words, is utter nonsense to our 
minds. It is, indeed, from the mental satisfaction 
that we feel upon the solving of any mystery, and 
the removing of the natural uneasiness ofperj^lex- 
ity, that such high delight is found in the study 
of natural philosophy by those minds which are 
struck by the mighty mystery of the world about 
them ; and even though the light afiforded by the 
study be but as feeble as that cottager's lamp 
yonder, shooting the golden spider-threads of its 



300 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

rays far into the darkness of the distance, yet 
there is the same charm in the study to the 
thoughtful man as that earth-star has to the wan- 
derer in the night ; for to the intellectual miner, 
working deep under the surface, the faintest ray 
is sufficient for continuing the toil. Besides, 
there is a fine, rich, and sombre beauty, lad, in 
the ' clear obscure' — in that mere glimmer of light 
which simply serves, as Milton grandly says, to 
make the darkness visible ; and if philosoj^hy does 
but make out to us the black background of in- 
finite space and infinite distance, frowning be- 
tween the tiny star-points of its small discoveries 
— like the vast endless cavern of the incomj^re- 
hensible — there is still a solemn and deep beauty 
in contemplating the fine, massive, and unfathom- 
able darkness, that walls in the world of man's 
knowledge, and looking into it, as one loves to 
try and fathom with the eye the unfathomable 
depths of the great ocean itself, even while we 
wonder, wonder, and w^onder, as we strain the 
sight till the tears come, what is at the bottom 
of it all. 

" Again," he proceeded, " the pleasure that is 
found in clever theories and lucid explanations, in 
happy illustrations and apt examples, proceeds 
from the same source — the love of light in dark- 
ness, the love of rest after weariness. Now I 
pointed out to you before, Ben, that a sense of in- 
coherence and disconnectedness among a number 
of consecutive things distracts and, indeed, half 
maddens us, even as a sense of heterogeneousness 
and confusion among a multiplicity of coexistent 
things tends, in its turn, to throw the mind into 
almost the same confusion as the objects them- 
selves. So, on the contrary, a sense of coherence 
and natural order in the succession of events and 
ideas, or a sense of systematic arrangement and 



THE NEXT TURNING. 301 



fitness among coexistent objects, inordinately de- 
lights us, and it does so simply by removing the 
distress of mind which is necessarily consequent 
upon the opposite impression. What tidiness is 
among housewives, classification is among philos- 
ophers — the mere orderly arrangement of things. 
A large part of natural science consists merely in 
grouping objects together into genera and spe- 
cies, orders and varieties ; and these are merely 
so many separate pigeon-holes, as it were, for the 
convenient sorting of the ' notes' of the brain, so 
that one may be able to lay hold of any missing 
memorandum in a minute. By these means the 
mental and natural chaos of the world to ignorant 
eyes is brought into something like the order that 
the Almighty has impressed upon creation, and 
the mind enabled to look down, almost from the 
very altitude of heaven itself, and take something 
like an angel's broad view of the universe and 
its infinite variety of phenomena. And it is the 
vast comprehension and clear-sightedness that 
the mind thus obtains from philosophic teachings 
which serve to give the highest mental satisfac- 
tion to the student. By this means the very rocks 
and stones have been, as it were, numbered and 
labeled ; every beast in the field and forest, every 
bird, and, indeed, every tiny insect in the air and 
among the grass ; every fish, ay, and almost every 
animalcule in the water, has been studied and al- 
lotted its due place in creation ; every flower in 
the hedgerow, too, in the garden, in the desert, 
and on the mountain top ; every tree, shrub, and 
herb on the earth, down even to every little piece 
of moss and weed on the rocks and ruins ; every 
shell upon the shore ; every little star in the sky ; 
every lump of matter in the world ; every crystal 
form found in the caves ; every bit of metal in 
the mines ; every gas in the atmosphere; every 



308 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

color, every hue, and every form ; every bend and 
motion of the light ; every force and power at 
work in the universe ; every country, every sea, 
and almost every river, mountain, and town, over 
the whole globe ; every bone, muscle, blood-ves- 
sel, nerve, gland, and organ throughout the body, 
ay, and almost every feeling and faculty that there 
is in the mind, have all been noted, scanned, de- 
scribed, and duly mapped out, and that so lucidly 
that the intellect can see with an eagle glance, as 
it soars high into the air, the whole of the world, 
the whole of life, ay, and almost the whole of the 
universe at once. Xor is this all : the very order 
of events themselves, the secret machinery and 
almost mainsj^ring of the movements of the plan- 
ets, and our own earth and moon, have all been 
laid bare, and the endless chaj^ter of accidents of 
w^hich life and nature appear to the vulgar to be 
composed have been shown to be part of one 
mighty system, where all is harmony and propor- 
tion, law and order, and where the music of the 
spheres is but the resonance of the universal con- 
cord of things — the very breath of heaven, breath- 
ing a fine suggestive sweetness into the thrilling 
chords of ISTatm-e's grand JEolian harp." 

THE PLEASURES OF MENTAL HABITS. 

"And now, uncle," said the boy, as his god- 
father paused once more on coming to the end 
of the subject, "you've got only the pleasure of 
mental habit to explain, haven't you ?" 

The old man answered, " Yes, lad, that follows 
next, certainly ; but after that there will still be 
the pleasures that proceed from our jDcrception 
of artistic power, both in man and the great 
Creator of all things. Now, my little fellov/, do 
you remember what I told you was the special 
function of habit ? Let me hear." 



THE NEXT TUKNING. 303 

"Oh yes, uncle," spoke out the boy, as he 
turned round and looked his godfather full in the 
face, smiling the while with the simple pride of 
his heart at the knowledge he felt within him ; 
" you said habit rendered that which was at first 
irksome to do, pleasurable after a time to per- 
form, and you said, too — " 

"That will do, good fellow," interrupted the 
tutor, with a pressure on the boy's plump palm 
that wdiispered a volume of fine pleasant things 
into his heart ; " that is sufiicient for us to bear 
in mind at present — except, indeed, you should 
recollect also what I told you at the time was the 
wondrous character of the change wrought by 
habit. You should remember that the mere con- 
tinued repetition of an act can render it, however 
difiicult and distasteful at first, easy and con- 
genial to us at last ; that it can transform pain 
into pleasure, labor into comparative pastime, and 
give to the most arduous voluntary actions all the 
simplicity and insensibility of mere clock-work." 

" I remember it well, unky, dear," added young 
Ben. 

"Well, then, lad," proceeded the old man, 
" what we have now to consider is the mental 
pleasure that we derive from the mere principle 
of repetition, of which habit, or the lyropensity to 
repeat, is the special consequence. The first dis- 
tinctive mark of the repetitive principle, then, is 
its sedative influence on the system; that is to 
say, its power to allay, or, rather, to deaden the 
pain or uneasiness connected with any violent or 
unusual exertion. Even the most agreeable im- 
pression, continually iterated and reiterated for 
a certain length of time, eventually palls upon 
us; for the pleasure connected with it becomes 
gradually weaker and Aveaker with the continued 
repetition, and ultimately passes, by fine and al- 



304 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

most insensible degrees, into disgust and tedium, 
while it occasionally finishes by being absolutely 
overpowering in its ofiensiveness to the surfeited 
nature. This is the case not only with the sweets 
that to a child's palate are morsels of solid melt- 
ing delight, yet gross sickly stuff" to the more ma- 
ture and refined taste of manhood, but it is the 
same also (as I before pointed out to you) with 
what is called 'monotony;' for, no matter how 
intrinsically beautiful the thing iterated may ap- 
pear at first to the mind, the continued reiteration 
of it is sure, sooner or later, to produce tedium 
and weariness, and that even until the mind feels 
the same fatigue almost as the body does after 
long exercise, and the same disposition to lapse 
into that slighter form of mental coma — that soft 
swoon of the tired senses, from which the patient 
can be roused with comparatively little difficulty, 
and which is commonly denominated ' sleep.' 
Hence the sedative effect of certain continuously- 
recurrent sounds in nature : the murmur of the 
brooks, for instance, the throb of the water-wheel, 
and the lullaby of the mother; and hence the 
means of producing sleep artificially are all made 
to depend upon the lulling power of the contin- 
ued repetition of the same idea, such as fancying 
one sees a flock of sheep going through a gate 
one after another, or imagining one's self to be 
counting some hundreds of nails successively.* 
Now the sense of pleasure and ease which the 
mind obtains from this same principle of mere 

* The sleep induced by what is called "Mesmerism," or 
"Animal Magnetism," or " Electro-Biology, " may also be 
cited as an instance of the comatose tendency of the long 
persistence of one and the same object before the mind. The 
hypnotic "fluid," which is supposed to pass from the agent 
to the patient, under such circumstances may be extracted 
from a prosy book, a dull sermon, a boring lecture, et id 
genus omne. 



THE NEXT TUKNING. 306 

repetition appears to lie at the base of a consid- 
erable number of our purest mental delights. 
There must surely be an innate gratification iii 
the simple recognition of an object, else why the 
special charm of an old familiar face, or even an 
old famihar tree, or of that group of old familiar 
objects which makes up the happy integrity of 
. some old famihar haunt? Granted every such 
object is mantled with green associations as thick- 
ly as the old church with its clustering ivy, and 
that the sight of them revives some bright and 
lovely memory, one after another, till the brain 
buzzes with the golden bits of life like to a hive 
of bees ; and granted, too, that this mere move- 
ment of the associations in the mind is, as I said 
before, sufficient to account for a large portion 
of the mental delight felt under such cii'cum- 
stances ; still, that the simple recognition of the 
old things and places has a chann of its own, 
apart from any pleasure associated with the ob- 
jects themselves, is proved by the attraction that 
the mere repetitive processes of art have for even 
the commonest minds. This is shown in the de- 
light the vulgar feel in mere imitation — in the 
shadow of the rabbit on the wall, in which the 
baby itself finds pleasure ; in mimicry of manners 
and tones— in pictorial representations of ' still 
life'— in 'striking likenesses' — in perfect copies 
of any kind, or models— and even in the contin- 
ually-recurring chorus to a song, as well as the 
impressive burden of some i3laintive ballad, or the 
perpetually reiterated ' gag- words' of the mum- 
mers on the stage. Again, we all know how in- 
tense^ a pleasure there is in the repetition of a 
favorite air, and how the people of some countries 
are stirred to the very depths of their souls on 
hearing some pet piece of their national music 
when far away from their home and fatherland. 
U 



306 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

Indeed, the mere euforced repetition of a word in 
literary or poetical composition can often lend in- 
tense beauty to a passage.* 

* But not only is the repetition of the same word when 
finely worked, so as to enforce some one idea upon the miud, 
a source of great intellectual delight, but even the repetition 
of the same initial letter, when it is used as a means of link- 
ing together, or giving the fancy some faint notion of resem- 
blance between ideas that are diametrically opposed, has a 
small charm appertaining to it. Pope, who perhaps was the 
greatest poetic artist the world ever saw, and that without 
even a twinkle of high poetic genius in his composition, oft- 
en made fine use of this alliterative trick ; e. g., he says, 

- " But thousands die without this or that, 
Die and endow a college or a cat." 

Farther, in his " Imitations of Horace," the same author 

says: 

" Fill hut his purse, our poet's work is done, 
Alike to him, by pathos or by pun." 

In another place ("Moral Essays") he treats us to the fol- 
lowing couplet : 

" Or her whose life the church and scandal share, 
Forever in a passion or a prayer." 

However, in the "Rape of the Lock," he describes the ap- 
paratus of Belinda's toilet in one neat alliterative line, as 
" Puffs, powders, patches— Bibles, billet-doux." 

So, again, in the Nursery Rhymes, the alliterative process 
is used as a means of tickling the brain even of children 
themselves, as in " Peter Piper picked a peck of pepper," and 
" Roderick Random rode a raw-boned racer, " etc. Parther, 
entire poems — poems of hundreds of lines in length — have 
been written in which the feat has been to make each word 
begin with the same initial letter. The old '■'■ JPapa paiiens'^ 
and '■'■ Pugna Porcorwii'^ are curious instances of this: 

'' Plaudite Procelli, Porcorum pigra propago 
Progreditur, plures Porci pinguedine pleni 
Pugnantes pergunt, pecudum pars prodigiosa 
Perturbat pede petrosas plerumque plateas, 
Pars portentosa populorum prata prophanat 
Pars pungit populando potens, pars plurima plagis 
Pr£etendit punire pares, prosternere parvos," 
etc. etc. etc. 

*^ Pur/na Porcorum, 

Per P. Portium Poetam, 1690." 

Again, Anagrams and Aci'ostics are other curious examples 
of the simple mental delights that can be associated even 



THE NEXT TUENING. m 

" *If it were done, when 'tis done, then 'twere well 
It were done quickly, ' 

says Macbeth, with a fine ring ii^^on the doing of 
the deed that apj^alls and absorbs his whole soul. 
h arther, what exquisite pathos and tragic power 
IS produced by the same high artistic use of the 
same snnple means after the murder in this play 
has been committed ! 

" '^"other'''^ ^"""^ ^^''' '''' ^'''^'' ^^cbeth) and Amen the 
As they had seen me with these hangman's hands 
-Listenmg their fear, I could not say A7nen 
When they did say God bless us.' 

And the great master then goes on to give us a 
wonderfully torching and grand sense of the in- 
cessant haunting of the guilty conscience. Kow 

with mere /e^ers themselves in literary art. In anagrams 
however, where the letters of the original word are so tiinsl 
posed as to express some idea that is intimately connected 
with the subject, the mind is occasionally thrown into a form 
of wonder at the extraordinary character of the appositio^ 
and set speculating upon what the old philosophers called the 
"universal fitness of things," and this adds greatly to the 
itera pleasure itself. As for example, when\-e /nd tha? 
the letters in the name of Horatio Nelson admit of being 
transposed into the words ^^ Honor est a Nilo,- the secondary 
Idea IS so strangely apt that it strikes the mind that it must 
have been foreseen, even from the very invention of the alpha- 
bet Itself. _ Again, there are many literal enigmas that have 
a fine artistic charm with them. The one on the letter h 
which IS generally attributed to Lord Byron, is perhaps the 
genius of this kind of mental turnery- this intellectual inge- 
nuity, which seems so akin to nice handiwork that one is led 
to fancy it depends upon the very fingers of the brain— some 
delicate cerebral touch, as it were, rather than the vigorous 
grasp of true intellectual force. ^uruus 

"7^"^^^ whisper'd in ^eaven, 'twas miitter'd in ^11, 
And ec/;o caught faintly the sound as it fell, ' 

On the confines of earth 'twas permitted to rest. 
And the depths pf the ocean its presence confess'd. 
^tY^L^^ ^'''?^.^ V *^e.«P^'ere when 'tis riven asunder: 
'Tis seen m the hg/itning, and heard in the tAunder!" 
etc. etc. etc. 



808 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

mark, Ben, in the passage I am going to quote to 
you, with what fine force, owing to its continued 
recurrence, the term she}) seems to strike \\\)on 
the ear, and to keep ringing in the mind as sol- 
emnly as a tolling bell. 

" * Me thought I heard a voice cry, Sleep no more ! 
Macbeth does murder sleep, the innocent sleep ; 
Sleep, that knits up the ravel' d sleave of care, 
The death of each day's life, sore labor's bath, 
Balm of hurt minds, great Nature's second course, 
Chief nourisher in life's feast. 

* Lady Macbeth. What do you mean ? 

* Macbeth. Still it cried. Sleep no more ! to all the house: 
Glamis hath murder'd sleep, and therefore Cawdor 
Shall sleep no more. Macbeth shall sleep no more !' 

" There is not perhaps a grander instance of 
poetic and tragic power to be found in the litera- 
ture of any age or any country than this, lad," 
added Uncle Benjamin. "The sleeplessness of 
the murderer is here enforced in so masterly and 
vigorous a manner, and there is such a fine super- 
natural and ghostly tone given to the words with 
which the murderer's brain is ringing, together 
with a dash of such exquisite beauty to relieve it 
in the lovely images of the continually-recurring 
sleep, sleep, that it becomes at once as touching 
and terrible a passage as Avas ever penned by hu- 
man hand." 

The uncle had been so rapt in the beauty of his 
favorite author that he was obliged to reflect for 
a minute as to " whereabouts he was" before he 
could take up the thread of his argument. ^ " Oh 
yes, I remember," he exclaimed, half to himself, 
" I was pointing out to you, lad, the delight we 
experience from the mere repetition of the same 
impressions upon our minds. AVell, Ben," he 
went on, as cheerily as ever, " it is the mere pleas- 
ure of recognizing the same quality or thing under 
different circumstances that makes us find such a 



THE NEXT TURNING. 309 

special charm in the perception of resemblances 
either in poetic figures or scientific analogies, or 
even the fiibles and allegories of literature and 
the parables of Scripture. In the vivid state of 
astonishment, you know, we are struck by the 
same thing aj^pearing to us under widely difierent 
circumstances, or in association w^ith something 
that is diametrically opposite from what we ex- 
pected, so that the perception of the marked dif- 
ference seizes and impresses itself upon the mind 
with all the vividness of an emotion. In the per- 
ception of resemblances, on the contrary, it is not 
the unexpected difference of the association with 
one and the same object, but the perception of an 
unexpected resemblance between two different 
objects ; the detection of one and the same quality 
inhering in two things that were utterly distinct 
in our minds ; the discovery of a point of unity 
where there is aj^parently such utter variety, that 
fastens itself upon us with such force and start- 
ling beauty. Take, for instance," said Uncle Ben- 
jamin, after a moment's consideration, " Shak- 
speare's lovely figure of early morning peeping 
over the hills, as given in the line 

" 'Jocund day stands tiptoe on the misty mountain top.' 

What a fine bit of painting is this, and what ex- 
quisite delight bursts upon the brain with the 
perception of the analogy ! Still, I must quote to 
you, lad, the sweetest simile that is to be found 
throughout the entire range of poetry, and which 
gives us the most graceful conception of unity in 
diversity that was ever achieved by art. Mark, 
too, how beautifully the idea of oneness in two 
distinct beings is enforced by the continued echo 
of the word. 

"'Oh, and is all forgot?' 



810 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

(says Helena, in the Midsummer Night's Drean*) : 

'We, Hermia 

Have with our ncelds created both one flower, 
Both on one sampler, sittmp on one cushion, 
Both warbling of one song, both in one key, 
As if our hands, our sides, voices, and minds 
Had been incorporate. So we grew together, 
Like to a double cherry^ seeming parted, 
Biit yet a imion in partition, 
Two lovely berries moulded on one stem ; 
So, with two seeming bodies, but one heart. ' 

" Moreover, it is tliis percej^tion of agreement 
between two difierent notes — the felt union of 
the vibrations, at frequent and regular intervals, 
between two musical sounds beating difierent 
times — which makes up the delightful perception 
of musical harmony, even as proportion among 
numbers is but the same perception of agreement 
between the difierent ratios ; the expression 2 : 4 
:: 6 : 12, for instance, signifies merely that four is 
double two, and twelve double six ; or, rather, 
that the same multiple (2) is common to each of 
the two ratios. Again, order among a number 
of coexistent objects is merely the perception of 
a certain agreement about their arrangement, or, 
in other words, a sense of uniformity as to difier- 
ent positions they occupy ; and this may be either 
the order of regular intervals, regular lines, reg- 
ular figures, or of what is called congruity, that is 
to say, of that fit and proper collocation which be- 
longs to natural or convenient association. And 
so, in the succession of events, it is but the same 
perception of agreement in the sequence of dif- 
ferent phenomena that constitutes what is called 
the order of nature ; for even the perception of 
cause and effect itself, so far as the natural beauty 
of the idea is concerned, is but the mental convic- 
tion we feel that the sequence of the two distinct 
events will be the same to the end of all time. 



THE NEXT TURNING. 311 

Farther, it is the like faculty of perceiving the 
analogies of things that gives us our sense of law 
in nature, and which confers upon us that power 
of generalization in science which is the high- 
minded equivalent of idealization in art ; that 
power of typification rather than individualiza- 
tion, or realization, as it is termed (for the latter 
belongs to the imitative and reproducing form of 
talent rather than the creative faculty) ; that in- 
ward referring of all things to the spiritual ' form' 
that exists in the imagination ; that mental re- 
garding of the particular thing or event, not as a 
disjointed or disconnected and isolated individual 
body, but as part of a vast and grand whole — a 
single thread unraveled from a mighty net- work ; 
a little fragment, let us add, out of the great ka- 
leidoscope, which, if we will but twist and turn it 
over and over with the rest, is sure to tumble into 
the most perfect form — the choicest symmetry. 
Indeed," the old man proceeded, " it is this per- 
ception, lad, of uniformity in variety — this sim- 
plification of complexity — this sense of universal 
oneness pervading even universal infinity itself, 
which enables the mind almost to comprehend 
the incomprehensible. It is, as it were, the one 
indivisible and unalterable soul, giving the sense 
of identity and perpetual unity, amid all the 
changes of years, to the entire body of the uni- 
verse. The faculty of comprehension enables us 
to grasp, even in the narrow compass of our nut- 
shell skulls, the endless expanse of the universe 
itself, and to stow away, within the tiny honey- 
comb cells of our brains, all the infinite variety of 
worlds beyond our own, and all the same infinite 
variety of difierent objects, elements, forces, and 
forms of life and beauty that make up the vast 
complex globe on which we live. Then, as if the 
very conference of this wondrous power on our 



312 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

souls was not sufficient bounty, the Almighty has 
superadded the mighty sense to enjoy it, and to 
feel the exquisite mental dehght that has been 
made to spring from the use of the faculty itself 
— to find delight in that wondrous and delicious 
state of ease and rest, of satisfaction, contentment, 
ay, and thankfulness, which laps the spirit in a 
j^erfect waking trance of admiration. 

" But, though the faculty of comj^rehension can 
do this for us, the faculty of analogy, or the per- 
ception of uniformity in variety, in no way lags 
behind. It is this which is the mental sunshine 
of the world — for it is not alone the light, but 
the very beauty of the brain ; this which puts to- 
gether the disjointed fragments of the great puz- 
zle, and makes a lovely picture of it after all ; this 
which tunes the jarring strings of the instrument 
into the grandest harmony; this which blends 
the little broken bits of color scattered over the 
earth into a rainbow ring, where the greatest di- 
versity melts by insensible degrees in the sweet- 
est unity ; this which sets the house in order, and 
decorates it with its choicest ornaments; this 
which is the golden thread of light stretching 
from heaven to earth, and uniting the world of 
wonder in a water-drop even with the world of 
wonder in the stars ; this which wreathes the 
straggling wild flowers of seeming accidents into 
a cunning garland of exquisite design ; this which 
gives the fine touch of nature that makes the 
whole world kin, and links all men, nations, and 
races into one band of brotherhood, hand joined 
to hand, till the globe itself is circled with the hu- 
man chain ; this, in fine, which makes the charm 
of all reason, the delight of all poetry, the grace 
of all philanthropy, the glory of all chivalry, the 
dignity of all art, and, indeed, the very beauty 
of all the beauty that encompasses the world." 



THE lOJXT TUENING. 313 



THE PLEASURES OF ART. 

" The pleasure produced by works of art comes 
now, I think you said," observed the youth, as he 
found his uncle pause for a minute or two. 

"It does, Ben; and, to understand this, we 
must revert for a short while to the special qual- 
ities of the sense of effort," replied the old man. 
" You remember, my boy, that I told you effort 
was mostly irksome and occasionally painful; 
while, if long sustained, it was fatiguing, and ul- 
timately overpowering ; for effort means that vio- 
lent or laborious exertion of our powers which is 
necessary to master some heavy task, or overcome 
some great difficulty. The moderate exercise of 
the power within us is, however, by no means dis- 
agreeable to us, as, indeed, we have seen in the 
simple i3leasure derived from gentle physical exer- 
cise itself. There is assuredly an innate delight 
in making our muscles answer, as they do, imme- 
diately to the dictates of our will — the same kind 
of delight as you find. Master Ben, in making a 
boat answer readily to its helm, or a steed to the 
bridle ; and this inherent gratification can often be 
noted in the smiles of a baby, as it begins to learn 
the use of its tiny hands, and in the little peals of 
hearty laughter that burst out when it begins to 
find it can toddle a few paces alone. It is this 
delight in one's power, too, which makes up the 
large human pleasure of success, though success 
itself is so often connected with the attainment of 
some worldly good that the simple charm of suc- 
ceeding is generally inflamed into an exulting 
emotion of joy at our own worldly prosperity. 
Nevertheless, our sporting friend could have told 
you, lad, the pleasure there is to be found in mere- 
ly hitting the mark one aims at; in sending an 
arrow pat into the bull's-eye ; in throwing a pen- 



314 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

ny piece into the air, and striking it with a bullet 
as it falls ; in snuffing a candle with a dueling-pis- 
tol; in walking along particular cracks in the 
pavement, or balancing a straw upon the nose, or 
even in mastering the slightest possible difficulty. 
It is the simple stimulus of gaining such poor tri- 
umphs as these that stirs people to take to prac- 
ticing the arduous physical feats indulged in by 
your tight-rope dancers, posturers, equilibrists, 
circus-riders, sleight-of-hand men, and so on, and 
this also which makes the vulgar find such in- 
tense delight in the exhibition of such feats of 
bodily agility. Indeed, every one is charmed 
with any work of ' skill' or subtlety, either of fin- 
gers, limbs, or brain ; for we are pleased not only 
with the exercise of our own power, but even 
with the display of power in others. Neverthe- 
less, to be impressed with the full force of this 
kind of enjoyment, two things are essential: one 
is, that we should have a perfect sense of the dif- 
ficulty of the task, and the other, of comparative 
ease in accomplishing it. If there be no sense of 
difficulty, of course there will be no sense of pow- 
er in the mastering of it, for it is merely the op- 
posing force without that makes us conscious of 
the action of the force within. Indeed, it is this 
feeling of opposition from without which gives us 
our sense of efibrt itself. But this sense of eftbrt 
— this sense which is made up of the double con- 
sciousness of hard external resistance to our will, 
and of strenuous internal exertion and determina- 
tion to crush the obstacle to our wishes — is by 
no means an agreeable feeling, or one that con- 
sorts with our nature ; nay, it is obvious that it 
must be antagonistic to it. Hence the enjoy- 
ment we derive from the exercise of power lies, 
not in the act of overcoming the difficulties, but in 
the/ac^ of their being overcome; and therefore, 



THE NEXT TURNING. 815 

the easier the work is done, that is to say, the 
greater the work which has been done, and the 
less sense of labor we have in the doing of it, the 
greater the enjoyment we experience regarding 
it. This is the reason why a sketch is often more 
beautiful to us than a highly-finished miniature or 
elaborate Dutch painting ; for, in the one, the ef- 
fect is often gained by one bold stroke, as it were, 
while in the other we can see the million finikin 
touches that have been niggled into it. It is this 
sense of ease, combined with power, that makes 
freedom of execution always so pleasant, even as 
it is the opposite idea of fatigue that renders elab- 
oration so disagreeable to us, as well as the per- 
formances of posture-masters and tight-rope dan- 
cers so unpleasant to refined natures, owing to 
the sense of painfulness or danger that they force 
upon us. Do you understand, my little man ?" 

"I think I can, a bit," was the diffident reply. 
" But, uncle, what has this to do with the pleas- 
ure we get from looking at works of art? There 
isn't any power wanted for art, is there ? for I'm 
sure the artist we saw was a weak little man 
enough." 

" The meaning of the word art, my dear boy, is 
simply power, even as an in-ert man means a man 
without power or energy," answered the tutor. 

"But I thought art meant cunning," urged 
young Ben. 

The uncle replied, "And so it does; like crcfft, 
which, however, signifies literally creation or sa- 
gacity.* But cunning, my lad, is simply keiining 

* The Saxon word Crceft signified power, force, intelli- 
gence. The Germans, Swedes, and Danes have the same 
word, written Kraft, and meaning power, strength, or en- 
ergy. The British equivalent for this is Crev, strong, and 
this is connected with the Welsh verb Creu, to create (Lat. 
Creo), and with Crafu, to hold, comprehend, perceive ; whence 
Crafus, sagacious, of quick perception. 



316 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

or knowing; and knowledge is power — intel- 
lectual power — the power within us ; the innate 
power of our souls and will, made to act through 
the muscles of our mind rather than through 
those of our body. The muscles are merely the 
instruments with which w^e work — the visible and 
palpable tools we employ to overcome some phys- 
ical difficulty, while the intellect, the imagination, 
the wit, the reason, are the invisible and impalpa- 
ble weapons with which we conquer mental ob- 
stacles." 

" Oh, I see now," murmured Ben. 

" Well, then, lad, to appreciate — to thoroughly 
and fully enjoy any work of high art," the god- 
father went on, " we must be conscious of the 
inordinate power of the artist ; that is to say, we 
must feel at once the inordinate difficulty of doing 
such work, and the inordinate ease with which 
the work has been done." 

" But how can I feel all this, uncle, if I don't 
know what the difficulty was that the artist had 
to get over, and whether he did the work readily 
or not ?" argued the pupil. 

" Of course you can't feel it if you have no 
knowledge of the matter, Ben ; and if you are in- 
sensible to the high art of the artist, of course you 
can't expect to have any high enjoyment from his 
works ;" such w^as the simple reply. " It is the 
same Avith the vulgar, my little man — and there 
are vulgar rich, remember, as well as vulgar poor 
— they are utterly dead and numb to one of the 
purest, sweetest, and cheapest delights of human 
life, and that simply because they have no sense 
of art or artist in the great artistic works of 
the world. To them a gallery of fine paintings 
is merely a collection of pretty eye-toys, and it de- 
lights them about as much as a child is delighted 
with the pictures of a magic-lantern ; a fine work 



THE NEXT TUENING. 31T 

of fiction is to them nothing more than a pleasant 
dream ; a fine poem simply a mellifluent succes- 
sion of pretty images and flowery figures ; and a 
fine piece of music a mere agreeable tickling of 
the tympanum. Such folk have no more elevated 
gratification from the contemplation of works of 
art than they have from the taste of a dainty dish 
set before them. They see the canvas only, Ben, 
and not the artist at the back of it ; they look 
upon the bright bits of nature without any sense 
of the God that created them; and hence the 
tendency of all art, with low artists who work to 
please the vulgar, is to sink into mere pretty sub- 
jects.^ With the higher craftsmen, however, pret- 

* This subject-painting rather than art-painting is the great 
pictorial vice of the day, and a signal evidence of mediocrity 
in the painters who resort to it. Of course, if a man have 
not innate power enough to impress others with that admira- 
tion of his genius which makes up the true art-reverence, he 
must adopt some extrinsic method of producing an effect, see- 
ing that he has no intrinsic merit of his own whereby to com- 
pass it. A tricky subject is chosen merely as the means of 
hiding impotent art. When a painter finds he can not paint 
to please the choice critical few who demand the display of 
something like power in a picture, why then he begins to paint 
to please the vulgar, purblind many, who have no sense of 
artistic power even when it is set before them, and to whom 
a picture is only a picture. 

" A primrose by the river's brim, 
A yellow primrose was to him, 
And it was nothing more." 

It is the same with the powerful subjects of the French 
school. Details that are naturally disgusting, of course, stir 
the soul more or less on being contemplated, and the emotion 
thus produced by the mere natural action of the disgusting 
details themselves the indiscriminate mind fancies to have pro- 
ceeded from the power of the artist himself, whereas such sub- 
jects as are naturally "powerful" and "stirring" are a sure 
sign of weakness in the man who selects them. Depend upon 
it, the individual who has, and feels he has, the true artist 
power within himself, always strives to bring the power of his 
picture out of himself and hates to produce a "powerful" ef- 



CS' 



318 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

tiness of subject obtains little or no consideration. 
The artistry of a thing — that is to say, its fitness 

feet by resorting to subjects that are " powerful" per ipsa. 
The trickster, however, who has no capital to trade upon, must 
get credit by hook or by crook ; and if he can not have what 
he wants, by honest means, out of the experienced and know- 
ing, why he must, perforce, fly to the "yokels," and obtain 
his fame under false pretenses. As examples of tliis tawdry, 
trumpery, loathsome, canting, sniveling, driveling, "stirring," 
"charming," "elevating," "reclining," teachy-preachy, in- 
ert kind of art, we may remind the reader of the band of 
abbey singing-boys in night-gowns, represented as bawling 
"We praise thee, O Lord." Then there is the sublime 
bit of devotion in false colors called ' ' Reading the Scrip- 
tures," where ive have a Quaker and his wife seated at a 
loo-table, on which is an outspread Bible and a glaring sinum- 
bral lamp! "The Eleventh Hour" is another specimen 
of the modern Cantesque style of painting. Then there is 
also the Sentimentesque school of art, done to please the young 
ladies and their dear mammas ; such as we find in the sea- 
pieces of "My Child! My Child!" and its " lovely com- 
panion," entitled, ''They're saved! they're saved!" and 
also " The Wanderer's Return." The last, however, is 
really too rich, as an illustration of the sniveling, driveling 
school of painting, to pass by with merely a cursory notice. 
This picture consists of a weeping young lady on her knees 
in a church-yard beside a mound of earth, at the head of 
which is a grave-stone inscribed as follows: "Sacred to 
THE Memory of SARAH, the beloved wife of the REV. 
HABBAKUK BELL, many years rector of this par- 
ish," etc., etc. ; so that by this clever and delicate stroke of 
suggestive art we are made to understand that the pretty young 
lady on her knees, with her bonnet half off, and a tear-drop 
on her cheek as big as the pendant to a French fish-woman's 
ear-rings (in order to give us a doiible idea of the intense 
mental anguish of the poor dear), is Miss Rosa Matilda Bell 
herself. Then we are farther let into the pictorial secret by 
means of a bouncing babby — which IMiss R. M. Bell has, in 
the fury of her grief apparently, thrown headlong (poor thing!) 
upon the ground beside her — that this same young lady is not 
only Miss Bell of the bouncing tear-drop, but Miss Bell of the 
bouncing babby too ; and that she is no less a person than the 
" Wanderer" to whom the picture refers. Now the artist, in 
true parsonic style, having divided his pictorial text into three 
words, and illustrated two of them, proceeds in due form to 



THE NEXT TURNING. 319 

for displaying the peculiar power of the artist — 
is sufficient for them, and hence even ugliness it- 

— "thirdly, and lastly" — illustrate the final word of the 
" title," viz., to make out the return. This is achieved also 
in the highest style of true Sentimentesque painting. In the 
background of the picture is shown the open church-yard 
gate, with the path leading to the darling old ivied rectory in 
the distance ; and down this pathway we see an elderly cler- 
ical-looking gentleman, with long silver hair, and apparently 
a touch of gout in his left leg, coming along, with his head 
bent and his eyes shut, as if he were about to say " grace be- 
fore dinner ;" and whom we no sooner set eyes upon than we 
feel satisfied, though we never saw the rev. gentleman before 
in all our lives (and never wish to do so again, we may add 
aside), that it is no less a person than the Kev. Habbakuk 
Bell himself; for the black hat-band so dexterously thrown 
round his broad brim tells us, or rather let us say hints to us, 
in the most subtle and poetic manner, that the rev. gentleman 
is free to indulge in a second marriage Bell if he please ; and 
that " Sarah, the beloved," whose virtues are recorded on the 
tomb-stone that sticks up, like a sign-post, right in the front 
of the picture, was his beloved Sarah. Nor is this all : ac- 
companying the disconsolate and gouty Rev. H. Bell (" many 
years rector of this parish") is a young lady whom the same 
pictorial instinct assures us, directly we see her, is another of 
^^ them blessed Bells," as the servants say, and that she has 
discovered her naughty sister Rosy in the church-yard, and 
induced the silver-hair Bell to hobble down there and forgive 
her, now that she has " returned" — after an absence of eleven 
months at least. 

Now this is the worst possible style of art — this, we repeat, 
sniveling, driveling, loathsome, canting, stirring, charming, 
elevating, "refining," preachy-teachy stylo as it is, and com- 
pared with which the fine honest old tea-board school is a 
manly achievement. Belonging to this class, again, are the 
"pretty-story" pairs of prints, such as "The Departure" 
and "The Return," as well as " Going with the Stream" 
and " Going against the Stream," Under the same trashy 
category, too, must be named "The Heart's Misgivings," 
and the "Last Appeal," and "Cross Purposes," et id 
genus onine. Such pictures, again, as "Waiting for the 
Verdict," and your "Ramsgate Sands," and "Derby 
Days," and "Found Drowned," are no more painting than 
reporting all the minute incidents of her majesty's trip to 
Scotland is either a poem, a drama, or a romance. Again, 



320 YOUNG' BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

self is often selected as the material to be adorned 
by them ; for, in the fairy work of true art, the 

the '■'■ profound"^ touches of other artists belong to the same 
kind of trick-art, such as Holman Hunt's cut apple lying in 
the foreground, which is sho^\^^ to be rotten at the core (how 
subtle!), and Herbert's ''Christ in the Caepenter's 
Shop," with the fallen planks arranged in the form of a cross 
at his feet (how suggestive !) — all which we are told is so 
"wonderfully deep." Such clap-trap stuff as this has no 
more right to rank with the achievements of high art, than 
has one of Tom Hood's rude sketches, where the pencil was 
always made to convey an idea of some sort, ay, and oftener 
a much more cunning idea than such mere surface tricks as 
those above described. How different was it with the really 
grand men of former times! In Rubens' "Descent from 
THE Cross," for instance, that we see at Antwerp Cathe- 
dral, there is no petty artifice to give us a show of profound 
thinking, but only a display of profound picturesque percep- 
tion, and profound power and grace in rendering it. The 
man straining over the top of the cross, with the end of the 
winding-sheet between his teeth, as he helps to lower the 
dead body from above; the huddled form of the calm and 
dignified corpse itself; and the soldier on the ladder assist- 
ing to support the heavy, powerless limbs — these are all given 
with such intrinsic force, and such utter absence of extrinsic 
trick, while the ' ' powerful" details, that in the hands of a 
poor painter would have been exaggerated to loathsomeness, 
are here so finely subdued and veiled, that we feel, the instant 
we look upon it, we are standing in the presence of a mighty 
artistic mind. So, again, what wonderful -v-igor of drawing 
and portrayal of the human form — in a position that it was 
impossible to have had a model to sit for, mark — is exhibited 
in the "Crucifixion of St. Peter" with his head down- 
ward, by the same master ! and yet the end is compassed 
without a touch of revolting or "stirring" minutiae in the 
means. Farther, what subject can be less pretty or even nice 
than Gerard Dow's "Water Doctor?" and yet, was it 
the prurience of such a subject, think you, that tickled the 
great Dutch artist, or the fine play of light in the beam through 
the window — the lustre of the upheld bottle as the sun falls 
on it — and the wonderful scrutiny in the upturned face of the 
old doctor himself? Such subjects are purely picturesque 
ones, and those who see only the opposite in them have no 
sense of the picturesque in nature, nor any soul for art, either 
in the works of man or God. The same thing may be said 



THE NEXT TURNING. 321 

Beauty can be wed to the Beast, and yet none feel 
offended at the marriage. Take the works of 

of Eembrandt's grand picture of "The Dissection." No 
subject could be more innately repulsive, and yet to an artistic 
eye none could be more picturesque, and no painting at the 
same time more forcible and less offensive ; for the details 
that a French artist would have reveled in, and done to gan- 
grene, as we have said, are finely kept in the background; 
the dead recumbent body being thrown aslant across the pic- 
ture, and half concealed by the figures of the doctors group- 
ed in front of it, and the raw muscles of the ann only ex- 
posed to bring out the fine rich contrast of the crimson flesh 
with the black gowns. What is your pre-Raphaelite picto- 
rial-reporting beside such mighty visions as these ? If the 
painting of every particular blade of grass, and making out 
of the several stamina of each little flower in the foreground, 
and giving the peculiar geological texture to all the foremost 
bits of rock — if to be "botanically and geologically true" is 
the great art-object, why, then, the wonderful literality and 
texture-work of the photograph must be infinitely finer than 
any landscape ever painted by Turner, Gainsborough, Hob- 
bemer, Poussin, or Salvator Rosa himself. But the fact is, 
this " truth" of detail is no truth at all, but downright picto- 
rial falsity. Why, it may be asked, should artists make out 
the separate blades of grass — each flower-stamen, and the pe- 
culiar rock-granulation in the foreground only ? Why not 
in the distance also ? (Do not laugh at the absurdity of such 
a question, but proceed.) The answer, of course, will be, 
The eye could not possibly see distant objects distinctly. No 
more, we add, can it see objects distinctly in the foreground 
either, ivhcn it is fixed or focused (for they are optically the 
same things, and metaphysically something more) upon the 
principal object of attention. If a true picture of some one 
scene in nature is to be painted rather than a thousand and 
one portraits of the thousand and one minute and insignifi- 
cant details that go to make up such a scene in the broad 
view of the landscape, then every collateral object must be 
toned down to the one on which the eye is meant to rest, and 
where, and where alone (from the very focusing of the eye 
upon it), the great intensity of light and shade, and conse- 
quently the distinct making out of particulars, will be visible. 
Every artist is aware that the great difficulty is to prevent 
making out the forms and colors of known objects in the dis- 
tance ; or, in other words, the difficulty is to paint them as 
they are seen in the general view, rather than as they are 
X 



322 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

Shakspeare himself: why, the mere subjects of his 
finest 2:)lays — 'Macbeth,' 'Othello,' 'Lear,' 'Ham- 
known to be when studied by themselves. And so we say 
artists have yet to paint the objects in the foreground as they 
really are seen when viewed in harmony with the principal 
object in the picture, and not as they are seen and known to 
be when studied specially and separately. But as it is, the 
foreground of your pre-Rai^haelite pictures is as imtrue to 
nature, ay, and as barbarous too, as Chinese backgrounds. 
This portrait-painting of each simple thing in a complex 
mass ; this reduction of all the details of a composite living 
landscape — that has always a special feeling underlying and 
spiritualizing, as well as substantializing the Avhole — down to 
the senseless literality of so many distinct items of still life ; 
this giving us a hundred different isolate pictures of a hund- 
red different isolate objects where only one picture of one 
compound object is needed ; this painting of heaven knows 
how many disjointed groups of people in " Eamsgate Sands," 
for instance, and giving to every one of the manifold faces 
making up all the manifold little cliques there each the same 
marked distinctness of feature and expression as the other, 
and making them out to be all doing and meaning something 
apart from the rest (even down to the model Italian boy with 
the model white mice themselves), and then calling it a pic- 
ture of the place, when it is no more one pictui'e than is the 
succession of conjoint "flats" which make up a theatrical di- 
orama, and believing that it is any thing like a composition 
when there is not even the vaguest attempt at fusing and in- 
terblending the rude and undigested mass or perfect chaos 
of divers and diverse particulars into the broad and harmo- 
nious entirety of perfect creation ; in fine, this giving to ac- 
cessories and subordinates the same luminous and chromatic 
importance, the same black and white distinctness of detail, 
and the same delicacy of manipulation and finish as the prm- 
cipal object itself; this senile copying of model legs of mut- 
ton (as Wilkie used) for pictorial legs of mutton that were 
merely wanted to break up the formality of the rack under 
the ceiling, and which the eye could not possibly have seen 
while looking at the main characters on the ground below — 
all this, we urge, is another of the crying pictorial vices, and, 
indeed, general artistic vices of the time. And it is one which 
the false doctrine of modern art-preachers is tending to drive 
even farther still into the mere literalities of reality, rather 
than to lead young artists into the ideal beauty of general 
nature as opposed to particular truth. Such false doctrine 



THE NEXT TURNING. 323 

let,' the 'Merchant of Venice' — are morally re- 
volting, and such as, if enacted in the world about 
us now, would stir even the dullard to the high- 
est pitch of indignation. And yet, graced by the 
touches of this mighty, masterly hand, the moral 
monstrosity becomes transformed into a high in- 
tellectual beauty ; the natural loathsomeness into 
the finest artificial feast; even as the manure it- 
self is changed by the subtlety of mysterious na- 
ture into food and flowers, or as blood is used in 
certain industrial processes to produce the high- 
est possible refinement. So, again, I have heard 
the Dutchmen in our town, Ben, say that Rem- 
brandt's great picture of the Dissection is a per- 
fect visual banquet of color ; and even though it 
is the most repulsive of all subjects, they assure 
me that the eye forgets the mangled corpse upon 
the canvas, and sees only, in the wondrous con- 
trast of the crimson hues of the raw muscles of 
the arm, and the yellow, cadaverous complexion 
of the body, contrasted with the black gowns of 

is a mistake, which proceeds from the fundamental mistak- 
ing of the very nature of truth itself, confounding, as it does, 
that which is mere fact, or mere particular, bare, bald letter- 
truth Avith law and harmony or order and fitness, which is 
the universal and enlightened spirit-truth of things. It is 
this modern artistic fallacy and consequent falsity that makes 
our pictures of the present day (with hardly one really grand 
exception) such gaudy, fluttering, butterfly bits of color for 
the eye to look upon, instead of being the fine, steadfast, and 
satisfying points of visual rest like the grand paintings of 
old. Compare, for instance, the sublime repose and har- 
mony of Rembrandt's picture of the "Woman taken in Adul- 
tery," that one sees at Rotterdam, and the rich clear-obscure 
of its foreground, with the pictorial riot, chaos, and hard 
chalkiness of M'Clise's " Robin Hood," and then surely none 
but the purblind and the tasteless will doubt for an instant 
that our own great artists have for many a long year " erred 
and strayed from their ways like lost sheep," and, moreoA^er, 
that the Shepherd of Modern Painters is not exactly the man 
to bring the flock back to the fold. 



334 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKXIN. 

the doctors grouped about it, the soul of the paint- 
er, reveling in the fine chromatic harmony. The 
lolUpop school of art, my boy, is the most sickly 
and childish of all, and tickles the taste of those 
only who admire a picture as they would a paper- 
hanging, for being a sightly covering to a blank 
wall." 

" But, uncle," asked young Ben, who was still 
at a loss to comprehend why so few should be 
able to have a knowledge of art, " how do people 
ever get to be impressed with a sense of this pow- 
er and ease, as you call it, in an artist. They 
haven't seen him doing the work, and they surely 
can't tell whether he found it hard or easy to do 
it then ?" 

" Indeed, Master Ben ! Well, let us see," said 
the uncle, in reply. " The strong men you have 
seen, boy, in the shows at Boston fair, whirhng 
hundredweights about their heads with the same 
ease as you would so many bladders, and bending 
bars of iron as if they were twigs, you knew^ to 
be men of great muscular poAver, because you 
were conscious that you yourself would have 
broken your little back before you could have 
lifted the heavy masses of metal they did, and, 
moreover, because you were eye-witness to the 
comparative ease with which they lifted them; 
that is to say, so far as your eye could detect, 
there was no straining to compass the effect, nor 
any ostensible sign of heavy labor in the work. 
Every one is a natural critic of such feats as these, 
my boy, because they know, from their own ev- 
ery-day experience, how iniinitely the task sur- 
passes their own physical powers. And then, if 
they think physical power in man an admirable 
thing, they will admire the mighty strong fellow ; 
they w^ill look up to him with a kind of half-rev- 
erence and half-love, not only because the might 



THE NEXT TURNING. 325 

that is in him is so much greater than their own 
might, but because of the ease, and, therefore, the 
comparative grace with which he accomplishes 
the mightiest tasks." 

" I begin to see what you mean now," mutter- 
ed the youth, as he chewed the cud of the prob- 
lem. 

"Well, lad," the other proceeded, " of physical 
feats most people are born critics, because the 
physical power in such matters is often self-evi- 
dent. We all feel and know, almost instinctively 
and intuitively, that we couldn't swallow sabres, 
or jump through hoops off a galloping horse's 
back, or dance the Highland fling upon a wire 
some hundred feet high in the air amid a shower 
of fire-works." 

The boy couldn't help smiling at the obvious 
truths of the argument. 

"Again, Benjamin, there are other feats of skill, 
rather than art, that almost every person can ap- 
preciate naturally ;" and as the old man said the 
words, the boy turned toward him, eager for the 
illustration. " Almost every one, for instance," 
said Uncle Ben, " can appreciate the art or skill 
of simple imitation. I do not mean merely enjoy 
the resemblance produced (since that depends, as 
I have shown you, on an entirely difierent sus- 
ceptibility of our nature), but I do mean that they 
can have a feeling at the same time of greater or 
less admiration for the person producing the en- 
joyment ; for it is this feeling of admiration — this 
turning of the mind toward the human cause of 
our delight, and having a sense of greater or less 
wonder at his superior power, that makes up the 
feeling of artistry — that is to say, of respect, and 
even reverence for the artist-power. The child, 
when it perceives the shadowy likeness of the rab- 
bit on the wall, Ben, and finds out that the long 



326 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

black moving ears, and bright white eye that 
keeps winking at it, arc produced by its father's 
fingers, depend upon it, looks into its parent's 
face with a mixture of love and wonder, ay, and 
of awe and Avorship, as it feels its first spasm of 
admiration for what it doubtlessly believes then 
to be a work of prodigious craft and skill. The 
misfortune is that half — nay, lad, more than three 
fourths of the world never advance in artistic 
knowledge and sense beyond the faculty of that 
little child, fixscinated with the wondrous piece of 
imitation, and thinking that work a high artistic 
effort which is but a mere trick of the fingers aft- 
er all." 

" And how do others acquire a greater knowl- 
edge. Uncle Ben ?" inquired his nephew. 

" Why, boy," the answer ran, " when they have 
had their fill of the various imitative processes in 
art, and wondered till they have no longer any 
wonder, left, for the once-wonderful artists who 
deli-ght in bits of ' still life' (in the painted slice 
of cheese, for instance, with the mouse about to 
gnaw it, and the jug of foaming ale with the 
crusty loaf behind) — for the musicians who excel 
in the reproduction of the cries of the entire farm- 
yard on the fiddle (the braying of the donkey — 
clucking of the hen — cackling of the geese — gob- 
bling of the turkeys, and crowing of the cocks) — 
for the ventriloquists who glory in conversations 
with invisible old cellarmen far under ground, and 
imaginary bricklayers up chimneys, knocking out 
imaginary bricks, who delight in frying imagin- 
ary pancakes, and in sawing through imaginary 
logs, and uncorking and decanting imaginary bot- 
tles of wine — when, lad, we have been surfeited 
with these mere tricks and antics of human cun- 
ning, and found out that the powers and processes 
which we once believed so transcendent, because 



THE NEXT TUKNING. 327 

we knew and felt they were far beyond what loe 
ourselves could compass at the time, are no such 
very extraordinary powers after all, but that, on 
the contrary, in the wide range of human nature, 
the faculty for imitation, or the simple outside rep- 
resentation of a tiling, is one that mere ordinary 
power of mind and manipulation is sufficient to 
compass — when we have made this discovery, I 
say, we go on continually widening the circle of 
our experience, and comparing one signal evidence 
of human power Avith another in each of the dif- 
ferent arts, until at last we come to distinguish 
the giants from the j^igmies on stilts — the creators 
from the mere reproducing creatures; and end 
by regarding those only as high artists who dis- 
play the most inordinate power of conception and 
execution in their works — power that can triumph 
over difficulties that would be overpowering to 
ordinary human minds, and yet triumph over 
them with the greatest apparent ease and grace. 
As you knew the power of the strong man in the 
show, Ben, instinctively and intuitively, by com- 
paring the exhibition of his power with your own 
power, and also with that of the most powerful 
men with whom you were acquainted, and then 
feeling that he infinitely transcended them all, so 
with the mental athlete ; directly we are conscious 
of his power — directly we know and feel that he 
can snap the iron chain of events in nature as 
easily as a silk-worm's thread — that he can crush 
the adamantine wall of circumstance hemming in 
our lives as readily as a wren's nest in his grasp 
— that he can make the most rigid and inflexible 
difficulties in his path as supple as the stems of 
harebells — and, indeed, that, like Atlas himself, 
he can stir the entire world with the force of his 
mere will as though it were a soap-bubble in the 
air driven by his breath — directly we know and 



328 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

feel all this, we also know and feel that we are the 
little motes, and he the bright and sunny beam 
from heaven, at once stirring and enlightening us." 

"I see! I see!" exclaimed the boy, thought- 
fully, as he inwardly pondered ujDon the high 
theme. 

" The pleasure we experience, my little man," 
the uncle went on, " in contemjilating works of 
high art, arises not only from the intrinsic beauty 
of such works themselves, but from that fine en- 
joyment which springs from the conception of 
the highest power exerted with the greatest ease, 
and therefore with the greatest grace ; for high 
art may be defined to be the voluntary exercise 
of high power with little or no eflbrt, even as the 
highest art is that sublime exercise of the Al- 
mighty's power which makes creation the imme- 
diate consequence of the mere expression of the 
Almighty will. ' And God said, Xet there be 
light, and there icas light.' 

"This is the very majesty of all art, Ben. It 
is impossible for the mind to conceive any thing 
requiring greater power to achieve, and yet any 
thing achieved more readily or more sublime in 
its achievements. The stupendousness and love- 
liness of the work — the flooding of all creation 
in an instant with that pellucid fire-mist, which 
forms the broad sheet of luminous matter difiiised 
throughout the world — the stirring of the entire 
universe with the undulations of the luminous 
ether-waves from one end of space to the other, 
circling and circling round the central point of 
rest like the rings in a pool, and flashing fight 
every where immediately in response to the great 
Will — immediately, remember ! — without any in- 
tervening event ! — without any intermediate work 
or labor to compass the end ! — without any ma- 
chinery ! — without any delay ! — the grand out- 



THE NEXT TURNING. 329 

ward result following as momentarily upon the 
inward determination as the passing thought il- 
luminates the countenance of man — this gives us, 
lad, not only a sense of the highest art, but the 
highest sense of art which the human intellect 
can ever hope to comprehend." 

The couple sat silent for a while, looking at 
the broad sheet of silver moonlight spread before 
them — looking at the million star-specks above — 
looking at the lights on the shore, and rapt in the 
great artistic wonder of light itself 

" The pleasure we derive from the love of art, 
therefore, my boy," resumed Uncle Ben, after a 
time, "is the highest intellectual enjoyment of 
which the mind of man is susceptible. It at once 
humiliates and elevates the soul: humiliates it 
with a true sense of its own inferior powers and 
shortcomings, and elevates it also with a sense of 
the perfection and excellence of the artist who 
has overwhelmed it with admiration. It fills the 
mind with all the glory of the highest conquest — 
the noblest triumph ; not the conquest of man 
over man, but of man over nature — the trium23h 
of heroic genius over difficulties. !N"or is there 
in the true love of art any envy of rivals or 
dread of victors, for those who are made the 
slaves of the conquerors are the most willing of 
all slaves — the most reverent of all children — the 
most loving of all friends. The wonder that it 
begets in the soul is not the wonder of mere ig- 
norance, child, but wonder informed by all the en- 
lightenment and beauty contained in the won- 
drous work itself, and made fervent, almost to 
worship, by the sense of perfection and power "In 
that which overpowers it. There is no power 
on the earth so mighty, and yet so spiritual — 
so kindly and so noble as the creative power of 
genius. The world's riches and nobility are weak 



330 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

as bubbles beside it; heroism and martyrdom 
are alone kin to it in force of soul. What if the 
rich man is able to appropriate a manor or a park? 
— can lie appropriate the sunlight and the shade 
— the color, the form, and expression of nature ? 
He may take a goodly slice of the earth to him- 
self, certainly, but he can not possibly buy up the 
beauty of the landscape ; he can not, willi all his 
riches, arrange so that he alone shall enjoy that^ 
for that is God's dowry to all who have an eye 
and a soul for art, and it is only the artistic sense 
that can thoroughly appreciate it. What if the 
noble can have a legion of toad-eaters to fawii 
and flatter, fetch and carry for him ! can not the 
great artist, in every art, have all the intellectual 
spirits in the world for his admiring vassals, and 
make them at once his very slaves and worship- 
ers ? And does the glory of a nation, think you, 
lie in its Buckinghams and St. Albans — the pet 
creatures of a foolish monarch's fovor, or in its 
Shakspeares, IS'ewtons, Bacons, Miltons, Lelys, 
Purcells, and tliose grand patrician souls that got 
their patents of nobility from the Great Creator 
himself? No, lad ; there is no equivalent power 
in the world to the power of genius, unless it be 
the moral power of the hero and the holy power 
of the martyr ; for these three, indeed, are but 
kindred forms of one insuperable and transcend- 
ent force — force of mind — force of spirit — and 
force of soul. There is the same self-sacrificing 
spirit in art as in heroism ; the same sacrifice of 
worldly riches and worldly enjoyment to the one 
absorbing love — the love of the beautiful and the 
gi%nd ; the same bravery of nature shown in the 
artist's sturdy fight for success ; the same prow- 
ess in carving his way through the host arrayed 
against him, and the same chivalry displayed in 
his ardor to do battle for honor and beauty. Nor 



THE NEXT TURNING. 331 

is true genius deficient, on the other hand, in the 
fine martyr power to suffer for what it devoutly 
beheves and reveres ; to suffer itself to be gibbet- 
ed by the rest of the world as a madman or a 
prodigal ; to suffer itself to be crucified with the 
scorn of purse-pride and the tyranny of worldly 
authority; and yet, amid all, to lift its eyes to 
heaven, and see only the bright spirit of perfec- 
tion that it delights to suffer for." 

THE PURPORT OF INTELLECTUAL PLEASURE. 

The theme was no sooner ended than young 
Ben threw his arms about his godfather's neck, 
and hugged him enthusiastically as he cried, " Oh, 
thank you, uncle ! thank you for the fine feelings 
you have given me ;" but, though the poor little 
fellow tried to speak on, his heart was too full for 
utterance, and hysteric sobs burst out instead of 
words, while Uncle Ben felt a tear-drop fall warm 
upon his hand. Then, as the lad hid his face upon 
his uncle's shoulder, the old man soothed him 
with fondling while he said, "There, don't be 
shamefaced, Ben ; give it vent, lad, give it vent, 
and it will soon pass away." 

" I feel as if I had got a ball in my throat," 
cried the little man, in a minute or two, starting 
up and pressing his fingers on his windpipe. 
Presently he began walking rapidly up and down 
in front of the rock on which they had been seat- 
ed, and, after a few turns, stopped suddenly in 
front of his godfather, as he exclaimed, with a 
thump of the air to enforce the speech, " I shall 
be an artist, uncle — I shall." 

" Lad ! lad ! lad ! how you talk !" returned the 
other. " Have I been speaking only to create a 
phrensy in you, when all I wanted was to beget a 
love. Say you'll be a king, boy : it's easier far, 
since no special genius is required for that. Say 



333 YOUXG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

you'll be a giant, even though you are born a 
pigmy; you might as well. Ah! Ben, like a 
hundred otliers in the world, you mistake a taste 
for a faculty, a mere developed liking for an in- 
herent power — the power to conceive finely and 
execute gracefully ; and this is a widely different 
thing from the function of merely perceiving and 
enjoying. All the world, if duly educated, may 
have the enjoyment awakened and developed in 
them, but the poioer can never be given to them, 
any more than one could give them the power of 
soaring like eagles when they lack the special 
organization of the eagle si^irit and the eagle 
wings." 

The boy hardly relished his uncle's demolition 
of his conceit, so he merely murmured by way of 
reply, " Now I suppose we have done for to-night, 
eh ? Besides, I want to get home, and think of 
all you've said." 

" Well, my good lad, I won't keej) you long 
now," returned the godfather ; " but we mustn't 
go without giving a thought respecting what we 
came for, Ben. You forget ; what you wanted 
was to be set on the right road, little man, but as 
yet we have only surveyed the quiet shady lane 
which you called the path of intellectual pleasure, 
so we have still to decide whether that will be 
the cleanest, or the most agreeable, or even the 
shortest way to worldly happiness." 

" Xo more we have !" ejaculated young Ben, as 
the omission flashed upon him ; and then he sud- 
denly added, "But my mind's quite made uj^, 
though ! I mean to go that way through life, I 
can tell you, unky." 

" Gently — gently ! gently over the stones, boy, 
as the coachmen say," cried the uncle, in a tone 
of warning. 

This made his little godson turn sharply round 



THE NEXT TURNING. 333 

and inquire, " What d'ye mean by that, Uncle 
Ben?" 

" Why, I mean, lad," he went on, " that you'd 
find, before you got half through your journey, 
that it was sore hard traveling. It's but a by- 
way at best, Ben, and if you want to make it the 
high road, you'll find, sooner or later, you'll stick 
deep in the mire, like many others who have made 
the same mistake." 

" I don't understand you, uncle — after all the 
grand things you've been saying about it, too," 
interposed the little fellow, growing half peevish 
at the crossing of his purpose. 

" Why, look here ! what did I tell you were 
the three main objects of human life?" the old 
man asked. 

" Let me see ! what did you say they were ?" 
young Ben inquired of himself; " though I'm sure 
you've told me so many things I can't exactly re- 
member them just now." 

" Business" — began the other. 

But, before he had time to finish the sentence, 
the boy had added " amusements and duties." 

" Well, then, lad," the uncle proceeded, " as 
sensual pleasures (or rather the relief of the wants 
and uneasinesses begotten by the senses) make up 
the main business of life, so the intellectual pleas- 
ures should form the basis of man's mature amuse- 
ment ; and, kept within their due sphere, they are 
the lovely, grand, and pure enjoyments of our 
soul. If, however, we vdll make a stern business 
of what should be merely a fine amusement — if 
we will be at play, lad, when we should be at hard 
work, no matter how graceful and refining the 
play may naturally be — if we vnll try to live on 
flowers (and, remember, the flowers are the most 
useless, though the most beautiful of all natural 
objects, Ben), and wo7iH seek bread, why, of 



334 YOUXG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

course we can't expect worldly welfare. Depend 
npon it, my boy, we have only to burst through 
the regular round of nature at any time for a 
whole legion of ugly imps and evil spirits to rush 
in upon us directly the magic circle is broken." 

" Oh then, I suppose, you mean to say, uncle," 
interposed Master Ben, " that was the reason why 
the poet had taken the wrong road ?" 

" Of course it was," said the old man. " He 
was one of the many poor fellows who try to live 
on flowers, and who starve rather than live at the 
business ; for, let a man be as busy as a bee, Ben 
— ay, and as thrifty as a bee too — he can not hive 
much of what the poet called the world's honey 
out of the buttercups and daisies strewn in our 
path. If the exigencies of human nature render- 
ed poetry as crying a necessity as food and rai- 
ment ; if the love of the beautiful and the good 
had been made an appetite, and had bred in us all 
the pangs of an appetite when not satisfied (in- 
stead of^being merely one of the many bountiful 
«/Vcr-enjoyments that we have been fitted to feel, 
on the assuagement of the appetites themselves) 
why, then, to have made poetry a business would 
have been high and noble worldly wisdom. But 
since the butcher will not take a lovely sonnet in 
exchange for a lovely leg of mutton, nor a tailor 
accept the finest possible ode for a superfine suit 
of clothes, why, the larder must be empty, Ben, 
and the back be poorly clad, if we v:ill continue 
toying with the beautiful, and at the same time 
warring with the wise." 

" But, uncle," put in the little fellow, " Shak- 
speare was a poet ; and yet, I think, I read up in 
your room that at the end of his life he wasn't at 
all badly off; either." 

"He was simply the finest and wisest poet, 
perhaps, the world ever saw, my good lad," the 



THE NEXT TURNING. 335 

answer ran, " and just one of the few profound 
geniuses that can ever make a fortune out of an 
art. You see, Ben, the great drawback of the 
artistic passion is, that it leads so many to do 
what you were about to do just now — mistake the 
mere love of art begotten in them by the grand 
works of others, for an inherent power existing 
in themselves. The intense admiration that is 
excited by all works of high art begets an enthu- 
siastic love for the art-creators, and this passion 
again begets, in its turn, a fervent desire in the 
breasts of those who feel it that others should 
have the same enthusiastic love for them. So, as 
each art-worshiper longs in his soul to be trans- 
lated from the humility of the devotee into all the 
glory of the idol, or, in plain English, to be re- 
garded as a genius by the world, why, it is not a 
very difficult matter for him to cheat himself, at 
last, into the belief that he is what he wishes to 
be. Hence hundreds of mere clever folk are led 
to make a business of that which should be mere- 
ly an elegant amusement to them ; but, alas ! (as 
in all arts it is only genius, or inordinate natural 
power that we admire and value) mere cleverness, 
which is simply ordinary educated power, be- 
comes utterly valueless to all who have any sense 
of high art itself. Consequently, your mere clever 
folk find it very difficult to get a market for their 
wares, and thus those who should have remained 
amateurs — that is to say, simple art-lovers — rather 
than aspired to be artists or art-creators (and who 
would have thriven as carpenters, builders, or 
smiths, or as house-painters, sign-j^ainters, or, in- 
deed, at any calling where more skilled or edu- 
cated handicraft has a value in the world), have 
to pay a long and heavy penalty for their folly in 
the shape of want, disappointment, and envy." 
" Oh, I understand you now, and see what a 



33A YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKUN. 

narrow escape 7" have had, uncle," niurnuired the 
youth. ''And that was why the artist we went 
to was ahuost as poor as the poet, eh ?'' 

The answer was, '' Ay, Beu, he Avas truly an 
art-lover, and should never have been an art-cre- 
ator. The poor fellow could reproduce fairly 
enough, lad, but reproduction in art is, unlbrtu- 
nately for such as he, the counterfeit coin that 
every true judge of the sterling metal rejects with 
disdain as a sham and a cheat." 

•"' Well, but science, you said, uncle, was wis- 
dom," urged young Ben ; " so I suppose the gen- 
tleman who passed all his time in collecting in- 
sects, and in looking at them — under the telescope, 
I think it was — " 

" Nay, nay, the microscope, lad," prompted the 
uncle. 

"Well, the microscope, then," continued the 
boy, " and who spent ever such a lot of money 
upon the little tiddy lenses to it, I suppose /le Avas 
wise, Avasu't he ? Besides, you know, he Avas a 
rich gentleman, and could aiibrd to indulge in 
such an amusement." 

" So could the epicure, lad ; and the one only 
differed from the other in the fact that the pur- 
suit was less animal and less gross," Avas the re- 
joinder. *' With the epicure, eating Avas a lust ; 
with the entomologist, the study of aninialcular 
liie Avas a hobby." 

The bov inquired, "And what's a hobbv, un- 
cle?" 

Uncle Benjamin gaA'e the following answer : 

" A hobby, my son, is any dry stick that big 
babies like to get astride, and go prancing and 
curveting through the great higliAvay as proudly 
as if they had a genuine bit of blood to carry them 
along. The fools in the old May-games Avere al- 
Avays shoAvn riding some childish Avoodeu liobby- 



THE NJiXT TUliNING. 887 

hor.sc, and tho fools of modem time — who boo life 
only HH a May-gurno — must have tlioii" }ioM>y to 
ride too. Originally the hobby-horse was a hack- 
liorse, that used to carry the same everlasting pack 
upon his back, and to be perpetually traveling the 
same everlasting road. "Jljcn the fool got astride 
wooden hobbies, and rode them with all the airs 
of a knight-errant, eager to win his spurs in the 
world ; and after that babies took up the amusing 
foolery, and went a-cock-horse on their granny's 
crutch, anticking along as though the wretched 
hobbling thing fulfilled all the functions of life. 
I fence, my boy, a hobby came at last to stand for 
any kind of senseless dead horse that will bear any 
amount of overriding ; indeed, it is a sort of dilet- 
tante clothes-horse — a thing for philosophic fops 
to })ang their mental frippery upon. Ilenco, too, 
hobby-riding is mere childish gamboling rather 
than the true manly exercise of the intellect — the 
monkey-trick of wisdom trying to crack the }jard 
nuts of the world ; as if the ape himself had learn- 
ed to play the philosopher, and deliglited to put 
on the sage's spectacles, and try and look wise by- 
staring hard at the puddles and the stars through 
the thinker's glasses." 

The lad was tickled with the figure, but too in- 
tent on solving all the difficulties of the problem 
his uncle had set before him to do more than 
smile at the image it conjured up ; so he said, 

" Still, unky, dear, I can't understand why, if 
there's no necessity for a man to follow any busi- 
ness, he mayn't continually pursue some intellect- 
ual amusement without being looked upon only 
as what you call a big baby or a world's fool." 

" There's only one excuse, Ben," the tutor made 

answer, "for a man laboring day after day at the 

same occupation, to the exclusion of almost every 

other object in life, and that is,}jecause it is abusi- 

Y 



338 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

ness with him ; that is to say, because the exi- 
gences of human nature at once demand and en- 
force it. But the man upon whom nature has re- 
laxed her grip ; w^ho has drawn a prize in the 
strange social lottery ; wiio, in the great conscrip- 
tion forever going on to recruit the standing 
army of life, has escaped entering the ranks by 
being allowed to find a substitute to do the hard 
work of the battle for him — for such a man to 
make an amusement a busmess — for such a man to 
toil and labor day after day at unnecessary work, 
as if he were toiling and laboring for dear life it- 
self, and that also to the exclusion of every other 
object in the world — this is to reverse the wise 
ordinations of nature, and give play to all the aus- 
terity of hard work, as well as to transform what 
was intended to be a sweet and graceful relief 
into an ugly sore and a source of endless irrita- 
tion." 

" But if he UJces to make play hard work, un- 
cle," again urged the pertinacious little fellow, 
" why shouldn't he do so ?" 

" Because, Ben, life should never be entirely 
sacrificed to play, or, indeed, to any one pursuit 
except that of work," the tutor responded. '' And 
there is no earthly reason why w^e should persist 
in working at this one pursuit day after day, but 
that we want food day after day, ay, and shall 
want it daily when we are too old and feeble to 
continue daily work. Besides, my boy, if Provi- 
dence, by some special and inscrutable act of grace 
toward us, has exempted us from the hard labor 
of life, and struck the iron collar of want's bitter 
serfdom ofi' our necks. He has not exempted us, at 
the same time, from the duties of life, but rather 
ordained that from those to whom much is given 
much is expected. Consequently, he who rides a 
hobby rides roughshod over all the soft ties of 



THE NEXT TURNING. 839 

nature, tramples under foot — like the reckless 
hunter dashing through a corn-field in the wild 
chase that he calls sport — all that was meant to 
comfort and sustain the suffering, and wastes, in 
the phrensy of his amusement, the golden means 
of relief to those who want. To ride a hobby, 
lad (even though it carry us like Pegasus up to 
the very grandeur of the starry universe itself), 
is, after all — if we are forever in the clouds — 
merely to sweep the cobwebs from the skies, and 
to soar, like an old witch upon a broomstick, far 
away from all that is required of us on earth it- 
self." 

" But, Uncle Ben," inquired his pupil, " if such 
pursuits are not hobbies — if they are really the 
business by which j^eople live, then there is noth- 
ing wrong in them, I suppose ?" 

" So far from there being any thing wrong in 
them when not made the one overweening and 
all-absorbing amusement of a life, lad," he answer- 
ed, " they are studies that make every one who 
has the faculty to comprehend the wonders re- 
vealed by them feel an everlasting poem in his 
brain, far beyond the power of even Milton him- 
self to shape into words ; and those with whom 
they are a business rather than a passion, depend 
upon it, find such studies — even grand as they 
are when occasionally contemplated in the lull of 
the work-day world — often harden into toil that 
makes the brain ache again after long laboring at 
them ; and as the mill-horse, who was kept grind- 
ing forever in one eternal circle throughout the 
week, found ease and delight only in xmwinding 
himself, as it were, on the Sabbath by turning in 
precisely the contrary direction, so the study,-/?! 
the revolutions of the heavenly bodies lends, .ihfls 
turn, an inordinate delight and grace to the round 
of intellectual pleasure on the earth. 



340 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" And now, lad, we have but to note how these 
same intellectual pleasures are distinguished from 
the pleasures of the senses to have exhausted this 
part of our subject. What did I tell you, Ben, 
were the peculiar characteristics of sensual en- 
joyments ?" and, as the old man asked the ques- 
tion, he rose from his seat, and, taking the boy by 
the hand, commenced walking homeward along 
the shore. 

" Why, uncle, you said," cried the little fellow 
— "for I remember it struck me strongly at the 
time — that as a sensation was always caused by 
the operation of something outside of us — " 

" Yes, those were my words, Ben," interposed 
the godfather. " Go on." 

"I know what you meant, but it's so hard to 
say it as you did, uncle," the boy added, after a 
pause ; and then, with a Uttle stammering, jerked 
out, " Why, you said we must go hunt for the 
objects of sensual pleasure in the world about us ; 
yes, and you said we must often have to pay dear- 
ly for them too." 

" That's perfectly right, Ben ;" and the kindly 
old teacher shook his little godson by the hand as 
he said the words. " And, on the contrary, the 
intellectual pleasures are comparatively inexpens- 
ive ones, lying mostly within ourselves. The very 
perception of beauty (which is perhaps the largest 
intellectual sense of all, being connected with al- 
most every source of mental enjoyment) is a fac- 
ulty that admits of continual gratification with- 
out cost. The whole world, if we will but open 
our eyes to it, is one vast temple of beauty, filled 
with works of the choicest art, and this the very 
beggar or pauper is as free as the prince to enjoy; 
lOr*i^ is a luxury that is priceless in a double sense, 
costing nothing, and yet being beyond all cost. 
Look here, lad — " and he stopped and turned to- 



THE NEXT TURNING. 3*1 

ward the moon that was flooding the bay with all 
the soft splendor of the silver sunlight of its beams. 
"Look here! What pomp of kings was ever 
equal to this ? What palace was ever so gorgeous 
with its million lights as this vast starry hall? 
and yet it is lighted up even for the vagrant and 
the outcast, as well as for you or me. Who can 
appropriate this magnificent scene, boy ? Who 
can buy this up so that he alone may enjoy it? 
And yet, lovely as all this now is, what a mighty 
transformation — what a new beauty will be 
brought about in a few hours ! Think how the 
now colorless earth will then leap into a million 
hues with the first flash of the daylight; how 
these dark fields will suddenly glitter in the sun 
with all the golden-green lustre of the peacock's 
plumage ; how the stars above will fade one by 
one from the skies, and the bright-colored little 
stars of the earth begin to peep out from the 
hedgerows and the meadows ! How this broad 
ocean, which is more like one immense floor of 
silver, will then be red as wine with the ruby 
light ; and think, too, boy, that this is a feast 
spread for us all, day after day, and a feast which 
never cloys — never surfeits." 

The boy kissed his uncle's hand in gratitude 
for the pleasant knowledge and high perceptions 
he had given him. He was like a young bird 
whom the old one was teaching to fly, and he 
found no little difficulty in keeping on the wing 
after hira, so he rested in silent admiration till the 
other continued. 

" But not only is there the usual beauty of na- 
ture, Ben, ever open to us, but there is the beauty 
of the peculiar trains of thoughts and feelings be- 
gotten by the peculiar nooks and corners of the 
earth : the beauty of the solemn mood inspired 
by the woods — the calm, contemplative spirit en- 



342 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

gendered by the quiet lanes — the gentle cheerful- 
ness begotten by the brook-side — the sweet seren- 
ity of soul impressed by the sea-shore. Again, 
in the very associations with which the mind is 
forever strewing our path through life — like flow- 
ers scattered as we go — there is a large fund of de- 
light always stored within ourselves. Our home 
is home only from the cluster of sweet associa- 
tions that hang about the old house, thick and 
pleasant as a cloud of jasmine at the porch; not 
a tree in the fields w^here we sported in our youth 
but is entwined all round with the tendrils of 
many a sweet-scented memory ; not an old friend's 
face that is not lighted up in our eyes with the 
recollection of all the haj^piness and all the many 
little kindnesses rendered to us. So, too, with 
the imagination : we have here also in our power 
a mighty principle of delight. Even with the very 
young, their plays — their little pretendings — their 
sham feasts — their mock battles — their love of 
fairy stories — all owe their pleasure to the charm 
of the fancy within us ; while even to the more 
mature, the frost on the window-pane, which the 
mind loves to shape into so many grotesque pic- 
tures, and the glowing sea-coal fire that w^e love 
to sit and look at, and trace faces, and mountains, 
and what not, amid the red-hot coals, can give the 
fancy many an hour's pleasant play: even as to 
the poor prisoner, barred and bolted in his living 
tomb, the imagination is the great liberator ; for 
this at any time can set him free in mind, and 
carry him, in fancy, home to his friends again. 
Indeed, lad, the world within — if we will but wan- 
der in it — is as richly stocked w^ith beauty and 
tT?asures as the world w^ithout, and with beauty 
and treasures that are all our own too. It is in 
our brain the fairies dwell, and the flowers they 
nestle in bloom there too; there the gorgeous 



THE NEXT TURNING. 343 

land of romance and enchantment is to be found ; 
there, and there only, can we find Utopia, the isl- 
and of perfect happiness ; there the wood nymphs 
and the water nymphs are ever lurking in the 
mythic streams and groves, and waiting but for 
one wave of the fancy's wand to summon all to 
life; there lies the realm of all ideal excellence 
and beauty, and there is no perfection to be found 
on the earth but there." 

Again the teacher paused, wdiile he mentally 
scanned the details of his subject. The boy hadn't 
a syllable to say. His little stock of words, he 
knew, was too scanty to trust himself to speak on 
such a matter; but his young heart was full to 
overflowing with that fine reverent fervor, that 
iris-like emotion (made up of all the brightest and 
warmest hues of the soul — love, wonder, grati- 
tude, and veneration) with which the mind al- 
ways turns to any one that has awakened grand 
thoughts and perceptions in it, and which IJncle 
Benjamin had called, in contradistinction to the 
moral sense and the common sense, the art-sense — 
the admiring, worshipful sense of human nature. 

Presently the uncle resumed as they walked on 
by the shore : " But even, lad," said he, " when 
we have to hunt for the objects of intellectual 
l^leasure outside of ourselves, and to buy them 
of others in the world about us, they are to be 
had for nothing in comparison with the costly 
luxuries of the senses. A dainty dinner would 
have cost me more than I gave for my copy of 
Plutarch's Lives — the book you're so fond of, Ben, 
you know ; yet see what a number of grand feasts 
you and I have had out of it, and still it has left 
not a twinge of gout in the brain behind it either. 
For w^hat I gave for my Shakspeare I couldn't 
have got a diamond bigger than a speck of hoar- 
frost, lad, and yet, if I could have had one as big 



344 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

as the knob of a beadle's staff to stick in ray 
shirt-frill, or as brilliant as a fire-fly to flash about 
upon my finger, do you think the pretty petrified 
dew-drop would have done other than have made 
a big baby of me ? But, on the other hand, see 
what a man I've become by j^referring to bedizen 
and bejewel my mind with the bright thoughts 
and fancies of those volumes. For what gem in 
the world is there that can compare with that 
lovely crystal book ? Was ever a bit of earth so 
exquisitely transparent as even human nature it- 
self is there made to appear ? Was there ever 
such play of color as there you see twinkling in 
all the hundred hues of human character ? Was 
there ever such fire as there, where every page is 
aflame with human passion, and every line scin- 
tillates with human genius? Was there ever 
such dazzle, such sparkle in a mere stone, however 
precious ? Why, twist and turn the bright ada- 
mant bit of art as you will, in every different light 
you look at it you shall see fresh flashes, fresh 
delicate tints and touches, fresh glitter and rich- 
ness, and fresh beauty too. A good book, lad, is 
at all times a wonderful thing. It is said that 
savages, wiien they first discover that a person 
has the power of communicating his thoughts to 
another at a distance by means of a few marks 
made upon a blank surface, fall down and wor- 
ship the writer as a divine being. My boy, a 
book is naturally but a few pages of paper scratch- 
ed over with a few fine black lines, and yet those 
magic lines are the means of enabling us to hold 
communion with the very dead themselves — to 
think as they thought, feel as they felt, hundreds 
of years ago. To read Shakspeare, my dear Ben, 
is to think Shakspeare, to be Shakspeare for the 
time; it is to have the same bright fancies flit 
through our brain, the same passions stirring our 



THE NEXT TURNING. 346 

soul, as he had while penning the book itself. To 
lift the cover of such a work is, as it were, to roll 
the stone from before the sepulchre, and have the 
immortal spirit rise from the tomb, quick again 
with the very breath of life and genius. But, 
though this is the natural marvel of a great book, 
its natural and spiritual beauty lies not more in 
the fine mental enjoyment it gives us than in the 
fine moral comfort it afibrds the soul. There are 
times, lad, when we are worldly-tired, when the 
spirit is footsore, as it were, with the fatigues of 
worldly care and Avorldly struggle, and it is finely 
ordained that it should be so. But then, ay tJien^ 
what balm is the mental rest and the mental ease 
of a fine book to us ! It comes as refreshing as 
dew in drought ; as sweet and grateful as manna 
in the wilderness. It is like the very rest of heav- 
en itself to get far away from the world at such 
times, and then the wizardry of a really grand and 
thoughtful work is felt to be the very power of 
enchantment. When we are sick of the world's 
fools, lad, and the world's cheats, and the world's 
heartlessness, and the world's trumpery, what in- 
tense delight then to slip away to our study, or 
to some pretty bubbling brook-side, and turn to 
the fond companionship of a good book, so as to 
get a smack of the world's wisdom, the world's 
greatness, the world's truth, and goodness too ! 
Could we have known the great sj^irits that have 
delighted and ennobled mankind with their works, 
we should have thought it a high privilege to 
have had communion with them, a signal grace to 
have gained their counsel. Still they were hu- 
man like ourselves, Ben, and had more or less of 
the weakness and pettiness of humanity amid all 
their strength and greatness ; but in the noblest 
books, lad, we see only the noblest part of human- 
ity ; its inordinate power rather than its ordinary 



3i6 YOCXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

frailty ; its im-svonted grandeur rather than its 
every-clay meanness ; and thus, by means of the 
best books, we get to know tlie best natures that 
ever Hved, and to know them in their best and 
happiest moods too." 

There was still another point to enforce before 
the lesson Avas completed ; so, after a brief rest, 
Uncle Ben continued : " I have now only to im- 
press you, my child, with a sense of the general 
imselfish character of true intellectual enjoyment, 
and then my worldly sermon is finished : I want 
you to mark well the distinction between the 
pleasures of the senses and those of the mind in 
this respect. With sensual pleasure there is al- 
most always a desire to appropriate the thing that 
pleases us — that is to say, to take it and keep it 
to ourselves, so that we alone may enjoy it; and 
some mean natures find a small delight even in 
exciting the envy of others by the disj^lay of the 
worldly valuables they have been lucky enough to 
obtain, so that the love of pomp and show, dress 
and finery, is often found to be closely connected 
with the poor glory of worldly riches. But with 
the objects of intellectual pleasure there is seldom 
any such drawback. As I said before, a man can 
not appropriate the beauty of the landscape ; in- 
deed, so far from any such greed, any such craving 
to mo)voxJolhze what pleases us coming upon the 
soul in a state of intellectual enjoyment, the very 
contrary feehng is awakened, and the same pro- 
pensity for proselytism sets in, as even in religious 
fervor itself, and we grow eager to make others 
see, think, and feel as we do. Who that was 
ever fired with the beauty of a noble or graceful 
thought, a grand discovery, or a lovely scene, has 
not felt a positive yearning of the spirit to commu- 
nicate the delight awakened in him to some con- 
genial bosom ! If it were not for this exquisitely 



THE NEXT TURNING. 347 

generous character of our mental nature. Chris- 
tianity itself would never, probably, have traveled 
beyond the walls of Jerusalem ; for if there were 
the same greed to monopolize a high mental en- 
joyment as there is to keep a sensual one all to 
ourselves, what desire could ever have stirred the 
early Christians to seek to turn the hearts of those 
far distant from all the horrors of paganism to the 
sweet benevolence of the ' new commandment ?' 
Again, Ben, if it were not for this innate love of 
sharing our mental delights with others, there 
could have been no philosophy, no teaching in the 
world. When you come, boy, to look into those 
wonderful elaborations of mental mosaic-work 
which make up the several natural sciences, you 
will learn how they have been built up, like the 
huge coral reefs in the ocean, by an infinity of dis- 
tinct and minute workers, all laboring away far 
beneath the surface, and each intent on adding his 
little mite of extra work to the mass, so as to give 
it ultimately the fine j^roportions of a great and 
mighty whole. You will then see, Ben, how little 
each has added, even after the labor of a long life, 
and how many had to contribute their quota of 
industry before the whole assumed any thing like 
the grandeur and solidity of a rock! And yet, 
lad, if each of these profound and minute laborers 
hadn't shared with the rest what he had beeq able 
to accomplish — if each had kept to himself the lit- 
tle bit of vantage-ground he had gained instead 
of letting it go to swell the common heap, why, 
what progress could any have made, or how could 
any have raised themselves above the mire ? 

" And now, lad," concluded the man, as they ap- 
proached the harbor of the town, " we have reach- 
ed the port we made for, and after our long voy- 
age of discovery you'll feel at least the delight of 
treading with a firmer-footing, and learn the pleas- 
ure of standing upon terra flrma at last," 



348 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 



CHAPTER xym. 

TEASING. 

The lesson of life was nearly ended. There 
was only one more chapter to be got by heart ; 
but it was a difficult one to study, and required 
close and peculiar observation of the world to 
learn. 

Uncle Ben had to think for a time how he 
should dramatize the story he had to tell — how 
he should put life and action into it, and give it 
all the vividness that scenery and incident inva- 
riably lend to a subject. 

However, at last he saw his way ; so, early the 
next morning, the boy and his godfather were out 
in the streets of Boston, going the rounds of the 
city once more. 

" Where in goodness are you going to take me 
to 710X0^ uncle ?" asked little Ben, as he trotted 
along at the old man's side, all agog again with 
the excitement of curiosity. 

But old Benjamin Franklin was too cunning a 
teacher to blunt the edge of what he wanted to 
cut deeply into the memory by satisfying the lad's 
desire at once, so he rather strove to fan the flame 
than damp the ardor of the boy's wonder and 
consequent inquisitiveness. Accordingly, he ask- 
ed in his turn, "Where do you think, Ben? 
You've been taken out fishing — you've gone out 
boating — you've been to the hunting plains in the 
Far West — you've been round the town to see the 
great human menagerie, and the strange rational 
animals collected in it — you've been on the rocks 



TEASING. 349 

by moonlight, and all to have a peep at the world, 
and iind out how to grope your way through it, 
and now — " 

" Yes, uncle, what now ?" cried the lad, on the 
very tenter-hooks of suspense ; and then added 
petulantly, as the old man stopped short, " There, 
you won't go on. How you do like to tease a fel- 
low, to be sure ! I call it very unkind of you, that 
I do." But j)resently he said, coaxingly, *' Where 
are we going to, unky, eh ? You might as well 
tell a chap ; besides, what difference can it make, 
for I shall know it all in a short time." 

" Well, then, why can't you wait that short time, 
Ben ?" and the old man smiled as he played like 
a cat with the little mouse in his power, now let- 
ting him run on a few paces, and now pouncing 
down upon him only to tighten the grip and in- 
crease the poor thing's torture. 

"That's the way you kept tantalizing me all 
the way to the prairies," muttered the boy, as he 
walked doggedly on beside the other. "I declare, 
all you did then was to keep knag-knagging away 
at me, for all the world as one see^ mother twitch 
and jerk away at the knots in a tangled skein of 
thread ; asking me now, ' Where I thought I was 
going to ?' and then, ' What I expected I was to 
be shown next ?' and after that, ' Why I fancied 
you took me all the trips you did?' and only say- 
ing, when I begged of you to tell me all about it, 
' There ! there ! patience, my little philosopher, 
patience ; you will know all in good time,' just as 
you do now." 

The old man couldn't help laughing outright as 
the boy mimicked his voice and manner while re- 
peating the reply, for he himself could tell how 
pat the little fellow had taken him off. Then he 
said, " Well, Ben, I had an object for withholding 
the reason at that time, and so I have now. It is 



350 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

merely a trick I have, lad ; just a trick, that's all. 
But come, Master Ben, where do you think we 
are really going to this time?" he began, again 
pricking tlie little fellow's curiosity with a small 
packet of mental pins and needles. "It's such a 
queer place to take a boy like you to, you can't 
tell." 

The lad was on thorns again. He had turned 
away half in dudgeon at the idea of his uncle 
laughing, as he thought, at his eagerness ; but the 
smallest glimmer of coming information was suf- 
ficient to bring him back close to the old man's 
side. " A queer place, is it, uncle, eh ? Where- 
abouts is it ? What do you call it ? What shall 
we see there ?" he inquired, all in one breath. 

But, poor fellow, the only answer he got was, 
"All in good time, my lad, all in good time; we 
sha'n't be very long before we get to it." 

The little chap could readily have cried with 
the irritation of the continued teasing ; but he bit 
his lip, so that his godfather shouldn't have the 
satisfaction of seeing how vexed he was. He 
knew there was some sight in store for him, and 
he was almost frantic with the rage of the appe- 
tite that the old man had roused in him. 

Uncle Benjamin, however, knew well how far 
to go. He knew that overstrained curiosity, like 
the overtension of any other faculty, will often 
end in the snapping of the very chord that had 
once so tight a hold of the mind, and that disgust 
or indifference are apt to supervene if the desire 
be too long foiled of its object. So he began to 
relax a bit, and allow the poor struggling lish he 
had hooked a little play of line, just to prevent his 
breaking the mere hair which held him. " Come, 
Ben," he said, in a tone that sounded as if he was 
relenting, "I won't tease my little man any more," 
and he drew the lad toward him as he spoke ; " so 



TEASING. 351 

where do you think, now, I am really going to 
take you to ?" 

Poor Ben wanted to turn away again, for he 
expected the same question would bring only the 
same evasive reply ; but the old man held him 
fast. " There, you're beginning your teasing 
again, uncle, I declare," cried the boy, half angry, 
even though he couldn't help laughing in the 
midst of it. 

" No, I'm not, lad, indeed I'm not," answered 
the playful old boy, who couldn't keep from laugh- 
ing too. " I'm going to tell you, for I know you'll 
never guess. It's such a queer place you can't 
think — the queerest place in the world to take a 
boy like you to, as I said before." 

" Yes, I know you said it before, and what's the 
use of repeating it over and over again ?" he ex- 
claimed, with a quick toss of the head, that ex- 
pressed whole volumes more than my Lord Bur- 
leigh's celebrated shake. 

" How can you say so, Ben, when I'm going to 
tell you, I say again," the uncle pretended to ex- 
postulate. 

"Then why dot-Ct you do it, and have done 
with it ?" shouted the boy, savagely. 

The godfather saw that he had gone the full 
length of his tether. It was plain the lad could 
bear no more trifling with ; so Uncle Ben said, as 
he stood still in the street, and looked the little 
felloAV in the face, " I'm going to take you, Ben — " 

The boy couldn't wait for the information that 
he now knew was on the tip of his uncle's tongue ; 
so, as the old man paused for a minute to give 
the words extra force at the end of the sentence, 
he cried " Where ?" 

" Why, to jail, lad — to jail !" was the reply. 

" Ah ! now you are only making a fool of me ;" 
and the indignant boy turned upon his heel, as 



352 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

his uncle fell to laughing outright at the little fel- 
low's exhibition of incredulity. 

"Hoi! what are you up to, boy? where are 
you going to?" Uncle Ben cried through his 
chuckles, as he saw the youth marching back 
home again ; but, finding the youth paid no heed 
to his cries, the old man set off running after him, 
his sides still shaking with the fun the while, so 
that he went along wabbling like a jelly when it's 
moved. 

" Come back, you rogue," he gasped out, as at 
last he got close up with the boy, and seized him 
by the collar ; " I tell you I'm going to take you 
to jail ;" and then, as he stared in the face of the 
astonished lad, he burst out giggling again so 
heartily that Ben himself — for honest good-humor 
is always infectious — was obliged to take the 
frown out of his little brow and pucker his cheeks 
into dimples instead. And there the pair stood 
for a while laughing at each other in the middle 
of the street. 

" You're only having a game with me, ain't you 
now, uncle?" inquired the pacified youngster, 
when the whim was over, and they turned round 
to resume their way. 

" I tell you. Master Ben, you are a little unbe- 
lieving Jew, you are. It's as true as gosj^el, lad ; 
and you know I wouldn't say that in jest," the 
old man replied. " I'm going to take you to the 
jail." 

"The jail!" echoed young Ben, in his wonder. 

" Ay, boy, the jail !" repeated the other. " I'm 
going to show you the end of the road to ruin in 
this life. I'm going to let you see what wisdom 
there is in the poor-house as well as the prison." 

"No! are you really^ uncle? Well, do you 
know, I've long wanted to see what such places 
are like," added the boy, who was now himself 



TEASING. 353 

again, and fully satisfied tliat his godfather's fit 
of fun-poking was over. " But still, as I don't 
mean to go to ruin, Uncle Ben, I can't see what 
good there can be in your pointing out to me the 
road to it." 

" I have no such object in view, my boy," went 
on the old man. " My scheme is not the paltry 
nursery trick of frightening you into rectitude by 
showing you the death's head and bare bones of 
worldly vice and folly. I don't want to make 
squalor and infamy mere moral bugaboos; but, 
rather, I do want to let you learn what kindly 
and touching things they can whisper in your 
heart's ear, if your heart will but turn to them. 
I want to use the ugliness of life as a means of 
giving you a sense of the highest beauty in the 
world, lad." 

" Oh, I thought you were going to let me see 
these j^laces, so that I might learn where I should 
get to at last, if I was foolish enough to take the 
wrong road," said the youth, still harj^ing on the 
old figure. 

Uncle Benjamin shook his head and smiled as 
he said, " The artifice has been tried a thousand 
times, and failed just a thousand times too. Peo- 
ple see thus much of life made out in the trashy 
raelo-dramas of the play-house night after night, 
Ben, and yet persons of my way of thinking — 
even though I do read and delight in Shakspeare" 
— he put in parenthetically — "believe that the 
morality of the play-house is poor powerless stufi*, 
after all. Even in the silliest works of fiction, vir- 
tue is always rewarded and vice punished, and yet 
the silly people who read them will be vicious, 
and wonH be virtuous, despite of the teaching. 
There is always a moral, too — some wretched, 
driveling, copy-book platitude — tacked on the tail 
of every fable ; and yet, lad, what bov was ever 
' Z 



354 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

cured of saying ' don't care,' because that wicked 
Harry, in the spelling-book, was eaten up alive by 
a roaring lion for it — even though the punishment 
is so tremendous, and the fault so trivial ?" 

Young Ben smiled as he remembered the ap- 
palling illustration of wretched " don't care" Har- 
ry in the act of being devoured by the hungry 
beast in the primer he had used at Mr. Brown- 
well's school. 

"The best moral lesson we can ever hope to 
give a person, Ben, is a truthful insight into hu- 
man nature," the uncle went on. " The idle scho- 
lastic method of connecting a prize or a thrashing 
with good conduct, or the reverse, exhibits the 
crudest knowledge of the motives of mankind, for 
it makes the object to be gained or avoided some- 
thing extHnsic to the thing itself; and thus, while 
it leaves the propensity to err the same as ever, 
it leads the mind to indulge in all kinds of cheat- 
ery to win the one or escape from the other. 
There is but one certain and sound way to bring 
men to good, and turn them from the evil that is 
in their hearts, and that is by attacking the errat- 
ic propensity itself, and bringing them to love the 
goodness for mere goodness' sake, and loathe the 
evil simjDly because it is morally loathsome. Once 
awaken this sense of moral beauty and moral ug- 
liness in a human being, and you are sure of your 
man ; for it is this same beauty, either of the 
senses, the mind, the heart, or the soul, that all 
are perpetually pursuing. But appeal to the mere 
brute greed of man's nature ; teach him that he 
can get something by being good, or avoid some- 
thing that he dislikes by respectable conduct, and 
depend upon it he is certain to remain innately 
bad at heart ; and instead of our reaping a goodly 
harvest of golden grain in the end, we shall find 
that we have raised ;nerely a vile croj^ of weeds 



THE LOWEST 



and tares, in the shape of worldly cunning, lying, 
and hypocrisy." 



CHAPTER XIX. 

THE LOWEST " RUNGs" ON THE LADDER. 

Old Benjamin Franklin had barely finished ex- 
plaining to his little nephew what was his object 
in taking him to see the sights he was about to 
show him when they came in Adew of a large, ugly, 
overgrown building, that stood just at the out- 
skirts of the town. 

" That is ' the house,' Ben," said the uncle, as 
they halted in front of it ; " ' the house,' as the 
poor always call it, for they seem to think there is 
no other house worthy of note in the whole town, 
and always speak of it as the particular thing of 
its kind, as we do, indeed, of the sun, the air, the 
sea, or even as we say the House of Commons, 
and the Bank." 

The building itself was of the bare, long, dead- 
wall, many-windowed style of architecture pecul- 
iar to factories, barracks, prisons, hospitals, and 
mad-houses. A huge light-house-like chimney, 
with a long black plume of smoke rising above 
the roof, would have made one fancy it was an 
immense workshop ; a few soldiers in their shirt- 
sleeves at the windows, and sundry pairs of regi- 
mental trowsers hanging to dry outside of the 
casement, with a sentry pacing in front of the 
gate, would have rendered it the perfect type of 
a military depot / or, had the long lines of win- 
dows been trellised with thick iron bars, it might, 
on the other hand, have stood for the county jail 
or the lunatic asylum ; while it only wanted the 
long board announcing that it was " supported 



356 YOUNG BEXJAMIN FKAXKLIX. 

BY VOLUNTARY CONTRIBUTIONS," and the little 
money-box let into the wall beside the door, to 
have converted it into an institution for the cure 
of certain diseases. 

Uncle Benjamin knocked at the gate, and im- 
mediately the little square wicket was opened, 
and the round, fat, ruddy face of the old soldier 
Avho acted as porter to the establishment appeared 
behind the gridiron-like bars. The man recognized 
the features of the elder Benjamin, and, knowing 
him to be a friend of the " Master," the gate was 
duly opened, and the couple entered the yard. 

Close beside the gate stood the square box of 
the porter's lodge, which gave one the idea of its 
being an enormous dog-kennel, placed there to 
guard the entrance, while the yard itself consisted 
of an acre or two of mere bare gravel, and this 
was kept so tidy, and had been swept so even 
and rolled so flat that it seemed like one large 
sheet of sand-j^aper spread over the ground, while 
in the middle of it strutted some dozen or two of 
pigeons, as pompous and gorgeous as beadles. 

To cross the threshold of the poor-house ap- 
peared to the boy like stepping into another coun- 
try. He had never seen such a collection of old 
people before, nor indeed people so very old ; for 
the inmates were far older and weaker than any 
met with in the street, while the younger folk 
were, many of them, either blind, crij^pled, or idi- 
otic. 

Little Ben had heard the deacons of his father's 
chapel complain, as they sat chatting with Josiah 
in the little back parlor in the evening, of the 
heaviness of the parish rates, and speak of the 
paupers as " a pack of lazy vagabonds," and his 
prejudice had been rather increased than lessened 
l3y his uncle's exordium upon work and thrift as 
the only means of avoiding penur}^ 



THE LOWEST " EUNGS" ON THE LADDER. 357 

But once within those walls, the httle fellow 
was staggered with the amount of worldly help- 
lessness focused, as it were, in that " dark cham- 
ber" of the town. There was every variety of 
senility, imbecility, and infirmity gathered togeth- 
er there, as if it had been a natural museum for 
the display of all the peculiar " specimens" of bodi- 
ly and mental inefficiency. Some of the old went 
toddling about in their suits of granite-gray, along 
the white border of flag-stones in front of the 
building itself, with all the ricketiness of baby- 
hood ; others scambled and shuffled on, as if pal- 
sied with weakness ; and other poor crooked-back 
things staggered onward, pace by pace at a time, 
with a stick in either hand to prop them as they 
went. Some, again, sat shaking on the yard bench- 
es in places where the sun fell, basking in the 
warm beams, in the vain hope of being warmed 
by them; and not a few had their white night- 
caps shining under their Greenwich-pensioner-like 
hats, as if they were ever ready for sleep, and 
waiting for the last, the long profound slumber 
of all. 

Then the big, owl-like spectacles of some of the 
aged creatures — the mumbling, toothless tones, 
and gasping, wheezy voices of others — the con- 
tinued asthmatic coughings of almost all — and the 
occasional shouting of some hale official into the 
ear of some one of the crew, as the gaffer stood 
with his face turned from the speaker, and his 
veiny, shriveled hand at the side of his head and 
close against the mouth of the other, straining to 
catch something like the meaning of what was 
said, all impressed the mind with such a sense of 
bodily and mental decay that ruin seemed stamp- 
ed upon every thing — not merely worldly ruin, 
but the ruin of every human faculty too. 

The boy couldn't help wondering whether TJn- 



n53 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

cle Ben or himself could ever come to be like one 
of those. 

Many of the young things in gray, on the other 
hand, were almost as powerless in body and mind 
as the old. Some had that peculiar dropping of 
the lower jaw — that dangling of the hands from 
the joints of the wrists, and that ^trange drag- 
ging, scuffling gait, as they went about, that are 
the outward visible signs of an utter want of an 
inward and spiritual every thing. Some, again, 
were blind, and sat in the sun with their faces up- 
turned, smiling vacantly as they rolled their white 
opaque jDupils restlessly and uselessly about, now 
turning them up half into their heads, and now 
wiping away the tears that kept streaming from 
them ; not a few went hopping along on crutch- 
es, or crouching down nearly to the ground, while 
others Avere bent almost double with some horrid 
spinal deformity. 

Then there was so curious and marked a shame- 
lessness, or apparent callousness in the faces of all, 
that this characteristic perhaps struck the mind 
Avith greater force than any thing else, after the 
first impression of the utter helplessness of so 
large a number had faded a little from the mind. 
Young Ben naturally expected to find that all who 
had a thought or feeling left would exhibit some 
sense of worldly disgrace or sorrow at being in- 
mates of such a place, and he even fancied that 
wretchedness and misery would be seen in every 
countenance, so that the decent-minded lad was 
half shocked when he saw the " able-bodied young 
women" stare and grin in his face as they went by 
in their duster-checked aprons and large white 
caps. And though he looked all around, he could 
not discover one dejected head, one abashed coun- 
tenance, or one tearful eye throughout the whole 
of that wretched pauper town. 



THE LOWEST "RUNGS" ON THE LADDER. 859 

The boy twitched his uncle by the skirt, and 
said in a whisper to him, " Don't they feel, then, 
uncle — don't they really care about being here? 
They don't seem to think it any disgrace, that I 
can see." 

" No, lad, they soon get settled down to their 
lot ; and such as do chafe under it, suffer more 
from a sense of persecution and wrong in the 
world than from any idea of worldly degrada- 
tion," answered the old man, in an under tone, as 
he drew the lad to one side. " If you were to go 
into a debtor's prison, Ben, you'd be struck to 
find that not one was confined there, according to 
his own story, for any just debt of his. So it is 
here, lad; for the mind never likes to see, and 
therefore never sees, its own errors. All these 
poor people are here, they believe, from misfor- 
tune, and many assuredly are so too, boy ; not a 
few are impressed with a full sense of their right 
to the place, and are ready to assert it lustily, I 
can tell you ; but none fancy they are here, depend 
upon it, from any imprudence or vice of their 
own ; though, if you were to listen to my friend 
the master, he'd want to make out to you that 
that was the sole cause of every one of them be- 
ing inside the gates." 

" I wish I hadn't come, uncle," exclaimed the 
honest lad ; " I shall never think well of the poor 
again." 

" Don't be hasty, boy !" was the mild reproof. 
" "We are every one of us apt to sentimentalize 
about such matters. We always come to such a 
place as this with some preconceived view — some 
extreme notion, either that the poor are pitiable, 
persecuted angels, or else lazy, drunken, and un- 
grateful scoundrels ; and if the real poor don't 
happen to square with our imaginary poor, why, 
we'll have nothing to do with them. Do as I do, 



360 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

boy — strike the mean ! strike the mean ! Don't 
put thorough faith in the injured air and misfor- 
tune of the paupers themselves, nor yet in the aus- 
tere and uncharitable views of the master, but 
strike the mean ! Every employer believes that 
he overpays his workmen, and every workman 
believes that he is underpaid by his employer — 
strike the mean ! Every mistress is under the 
impression that her servant doesn't do half what 
she ought for her, and every servant is satisfied 
that her mistress ' don't do nothink at all for her.' 
Strike the mean, I tell you, lad ! always strike the 
mean ! And there is but one Avay, Ben, of teach- 
ing either party its errors. Let them change 
places for a while ; let one of the paupers here 
become the master, and the master be made a 
pauper, and, rely on it, the master himself would 
take up the very same ill-used and right-demand- 
.ing air of the pauper, and the pauper, on the 
other hand, adopt the same harsh and uncharita- 
ble views as the master. It is but human nature, 
after all, Ben. Under the same circumstances the 
generality of peoj^le become the same as others." 

At this moment the master of the poor-house 
himself made his appearance, and walked with 
them over to the other side of the yard. 

"My little nephew," said the uncle, turning 
to young Benjamin, after the greeting w^as over, 
"is rather astonished to find that the poor crea- 
tures here exhibit no signs of shame, and has just 
been askmg whether they really feel for their sit- 
uation." 

"Feel, indeed!" cried the master, with a toss 
of the head that made the heavy bunch of keys he 
carried jangle again in his hand. " They hav'n't 
got the feelings of ordinary flesh and blood, sir. 
I've been master of this here house, and my good 
woman the matron of it three-and-twenty year 



THE LOWEST " KUNGS ON THE LADDER. 3G1 

come next Michaelmas, and think I ought to have 
learned a little about the inmates of it in that time 
—eh, Friend Franklin ?" 

"Perhaps you have been here a little too long," 
mildly suggested old Benjamin. "A surgeon, 
after long practice at a hospital, hardly J^elieves 
that there is any feeling in people under the knife 
— and perhaps it's better it should be so." 

" Bless you now ! just look here. Master Frank- 
lin. You see that young gal there — the one with 
the pail, slouching along as if she hadn't a bit of 
life in her — don't let her see you a-p'inting to her, 
my boy," interjected the master, turning in the 
opposite direction, as young Ben was about to 
raise his finger toward the quarter indicated. 
" Well, she's one of a long generation of paupers. 
We've got her mother here now, and only buried 
her grandmother the t'other day. ^N'ow, if that 
there family has cost the parish a penny, they must 
have put it to several thousand pounds — yes, sev- 
eral — thousands — of pounds expense!" he repeat- 
ed, emphasizing each word ; " and do you think 
there's the least bit of gratitude in 'em for it ? no, 
not so much as a '- thank you, sir :' why, they've 
even impudence enough to look you in the face, 
and tell you it's their rights ! — their rights, sir ! 
And she's not one alone. Friend Franklin, but one 
of a very large class, I give you my word — a very 
large class, sir." 

IJncle Benjamin merely nodded, and the other 
went on. 

" I have to look about me pretty sharp, I can 
tell you. Friend Franklin ; and, though I've been 
here three-and-twenty year come next Michael- 
mas, as I said before, I assure you these people 
here are as well up in the law of settlement and 
passes, and all that there sort of thing, as I am 
myself — ay, and they know the dietary scale by 



362 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANEXIN. 

heart, from beginning to end, I give you my word. 
But what annoys me more than all. Master Frank- 
lin, is the way in which these people can impose 
upon our chaplain, who is a nice, kind, easy sort 
of gentleman enough. I don't know whether you 
are acquainted with him ; but he's no man of the 
world, you see, sir — no man of the world ;" and 
the master put his forefinger right down one side 
of his nose, and bent the organ slightly " out of 
straight," as he looked shrewdly out of the cor- 
ners of his eyes in the direction of the elder Ben- 
jamin. " Oh, he is shamefully tricked by them, 
and often places me in a very awkward position 
indeed ; for sometimes, when I've been obliged to 
report some gal as riotous and disorderly, for — 
for pelting me with the suet dumplings, say, as 
was the case only last board-day with Mary Col- 
lins, because she said the flour w^as musty and 
the suet stinking ! Well, the overseers, as I was 
a-going to say, will turn to the chaplain's monthly 
statement to see what he says about the gal's 
general behavior, and there they find agin Mary 
Collins' name either that she is ' a-going on very 
satisfactorily indeed,' or else that he'd ' every rea- 
son to be gratified with her conduct,' I forget 
which." 

Uncle Benjamin loved a joke well enough to 
be able to laugh at the discomfiture even of his 
friend the master, and merely chuckled out that 
such conflicting statements must be awkward, 
certainly. 

" Yes ; the deceit of these people really sur- 
passes belief, sir, I give you my word ; and our 
poor chaplain isn't a match for them by a long 
way. Now, to give you another instance, there's 
Elizabeth Davis — I saw her in the yard just 
now," he broke ofi", looking all about to find the 
woman — "well, I suppose she's gone into the 



THE LOWEST 

laundry again, but never mind — as I was a-say- 
ing about Elizabeth Davis, you'd fancy butter 
wouldn't melt in her mouth, sir, and she has a 
tongue that would wheedle a charitable donation 
out of a pawnbroker. Well, sir, she's engaged in 
our laundry ; for, of course, I needn't tell you we do 
all our washing here ourselves ; and we allow the 
women engaged at the wash-tubs, and a few other 
perquisite women, who do the hard work of the 
house, just half a pint of porter after they've done 
their work. Now our porter, Mister Franklin, is 
sitch porter as it's impossible to buy in the town. 
It comes to us, you see, direct from the brewery, 
and is the real genuine article, I can assure you. 
It wasn't certainly the correct thing when the 
Phoenix brewery had the contract ; but since we 
accepted the tender of the ' Star,' there hasn't 
been a fault to find with it, I give you my honor. 
Oh, it really is a superb glass of beer ; indeed, 
ouv beadle declares it's the best glass of beer he 
ever tasted in all his life. Well, sir, let me see, 
where was I ? — oh, I was saying that that there 
Elizabeth Davis — Ha ! there the woman is now," 
he broke oiF; "just come out of the ' old women's 
ward,' with her sleeves tucked up, and her hands 
all white and shriveled with the washing. D'ye 
see ? there, she's dropping us a courtesy, for she 
takes you for one of our select vestry, I dare say. 
Well, sir, that there woman had her half pint 
sarved out after her work the other day, and 
shortly after that, in she bounces into my room, 
with the pannikin in her hand, and says, as she 
slaps it down on the table afore me, 'This here 
beer's not fit to give a pig !' ' What's the matter 
with it, Davis?' says I, quite gently. 'Matter 
with it !' says she ; ' why it's warjus.' Yes, that's 
what the woman called it; she did indeed, sir. 
'Verjuice, Davis!' says I, quite gently, but still 



364 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

impressively ; ' you ought to be ashamed of your- 
self to apply such wicked terms to the good 
things that the Almighty and the parish overseers 
provide for you, to comfort you in your poverty 
and time of tribulation.' ' The iDarish overseers 
be shot !' she exclaims. Did you ever hear such 
terrible language, Friend Franklin? 'It's them 
as pays rates,' she goes on, ' like my poor husband 
did for more than ten long year, as finds us in 
what we're allowed; and ray dues is what I'll 
liave, too, I can tell you, old un' — yes, sir, she 
called me ' old un ;' she did, upon my honor ! 
' Well,' says I, still quite gently, but firmly, you 
know, 'there's no other beer for you than this 
here, Davis; and as for its being in the least 
pricked, it's all idle fancy.' ' Pricked !' roars she ; 
' what's that ?' ' Why, som-,' says I, never losing 
myself a bit. ' I tell you it is sour,' she bellows 
out. 'I tell you it is not sour,' I answers, still 
mildly, but more firmly than ever. ' Taste it your- 
self, then,' says she ; w^hereupon, like a fool, I did 
raise the pannikin to my lips ; but I no sooner got 
it there than the artful, spiteful hussy gives the 
tin a knock at the bottom, and sends the whole 
of the beer right into my face, all down my neck 
and over my clean shirt-front, till, I give you my 
word, my frill was like a jDiece of soaked brown 
paper." 

Uncle Benjamin tried to look serious, but it was 
more than either he or Ben could do ; so they had 
resort to their handkerchiefs, and smothered their 
laughter in the linen. 

" Well, friend, of course that there was a breach 
of discipline," continued the poor-house master, 
" that I couldn't possibly pass by unnoticed ; so 
I not only stopped the woman's snuif and her 
weekly ounce of sugar, but I reported her to the 
overseers at the very next meeting; and when 



THE LOAVEST " KUNGS ON THE LADDER. 365 

they had heerd my case, and agreed that it was 
something more than disorderly and refractory, 
and amounted almost to open rebellion — yes, re- 
bellion, Friend Franklin, they referred as usual to 
the chaplain's book to see what kind of a general 
karackter the woman had before making their 
award ; and there, agin her name, were these here 
very words — let me see, how did it run ? for I've 
no wish to sp'ile it, I can tell you : 

" ' Elizcibetli Davis — conduct exemplary — oheys 
cheerfully — works hard and loillingly — is regular 
at her devotions — and altogether her moral and 
religions deportment of a very pleasiyig and con- 
soling character^ " 

Ben hardly knew which he disliked the more — 
Elizabeth Davis, or the master of the poor-house 
himself; and he was not at all sorry when Uncle 
Ben proposed, in order to stop the long list of 
grievances that the wretched, ill-used master was 
about to treat them to, that "the youngster there" 
should be allowed to inspect the " boy's side" of 
the establishment. 

As the master led the way, the elder Benjamin 
nudged 'the younger one with his elbow, and 
whispered under his little three-cornered hat, 
" Strike the mean, Ben ! strike the mean !" 

Once in the passages, the smell of pauperism 
was marked and strong. The whole place reeked 
with the true poor-house perfume, which was a 
compound of the peculiar odor of bread, gruel, 
treacle, corduroys, pea-soup, soft soap, boiled rice, 
and washing ; and as Ben and his uncle followed 
the master, who went along with his keys jangling 
like a wagon-team, the yellow sand kept scrunch- 
ing as though it were so much sugar under the 
feet ; for not a board nor a flagstone in the place 
but was as scrupulously clean and carefully sand- 
ed as the entrance to a livery-stable. 



366 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

They had not proceeded far, however, ere one 

of the pauper officials — an " in-doors' man," who 
had been promoted to the post of wardsman — 
came hurrying after the master, saying, " Oh, if 
you please, sir, there's three ounces of port wine 
wanted for the infirmary ; and quick, please, sir." 
So the two Benjamins had to be thrust into the 
bare and empty board-room, there to wait while 
the master retired to the store-room to see the 
quantum of wine duly measured out. 

The boy was no sooner in the large, desolate- 
looking apartment than he began staring up at 
the walls, and wheeling round and round, like a 
countryman in a strange city — now reading the 
large painted table of " rules and regulations con- 
cerning disorderly and refractory paupers," and 
now studying the printed and varnished broad- 
sheet, headed "Dietary table," and which, with 
a surveyor's plan of the parish and its boundaries, 
and an enormous map of the city, that was mount- 
ed after the fashion of a window-blind, were sev- 
erally made to do duty for pictures against the 
walls. Then the boy ran oif to look at the only 
painting in the room, which hung above the man- 
tle-piece, and which proved to be the portrait of 
"Margaret Fleming," who, as the inscription 
said, "died in this house, aged 103." Next he 
Avas counting the number of mahogany chairs that 
were drawn up in single file along the skirting- 
board all round the room, and so finding out how 
many " select vestrymen" were in the habit of 
sitting, on full board days, at that big horseshoe 
table, that was as green and bare as a billiard- 
board, and which, with the high-backed chair 
standing alone, throne-like, at the upper end, 
seemed almost to fill the entire apartment. 

But in another minute the master was with 
them again, and telling them, as he went jangling 



THE LOWEST "KUNGS" ON THE LADDEE. 367 

along the corridors, that he was afraid "the port 
wine would be utterly wasted, for the poor old 
thing it was wanted for was turned seventy, and 
had been sinking for many days ; but their sur- 
geon was such a fool, and really seemed to fancy 
they got their port from the pump." 

Then, as they passed through the women's 
ward, a hundred old crones, in blue check gowns 
and big white caps suddenly rose from the forms, 
and kept courtesying one after another as the 
visitors walked along between the deal tables, 
and bobbing away like so many floats experien- 
cing a rapid succession of nibbles. Here, too, Ben 
saw the sleek and fat poor-house cat curled up 
asleep in one of the old women's aprons, while 
the arms of another were laden with "little 
Roger Connell," one of the children out of the 
poor-house nursery that the hirsute old female 
pauper had begged the loan of to mind for a 
while, and whom she was fondling as if it had 
been her own, even though the poor pretty-fea- 
tured little thing was a mass of sore with the 
scurvy. 

" Yes, Master Franklin, you can get these here 
old things to do any thing if you'll only let 'em 
have one of the little children out of our nursery 
to pet for an hour or two," said the master, as he 
passed out of the ward, and came to the door at 
the bottom of the yard that led to the 'boy's side' 
of the building. " Bless you, ugly or pretty is all 
the same to them, so long as they're young; that's 
the only beauty in their eyes," he went on, while 
he found the proper key for the lock, and then 
paused for a minute before turning it. " I do 
verily believe now, that, selfish as they are to one 
another, they'd even give a goodish part of their 
week's bounce of sugar away to the young ones, 
and that the allowance might just as well be cut 



368 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

off altogether, leastwise for the matter of good it 
is to the old people theirselves." 

The yard door was then opened, and instantly 
there burst upon the ear a shrill babel of voices. 
Here the air above was spotted over with a per- 
fect covey of half-develoi^ed tadpole-like kites, 
while the branches of the trees outside the walls 
of the large quadrangle were festooned with the 
tattered remains of the tails and wings of others 
that had got entangled among the boughs. 

*' There they are, my lad," cried the master, as 
he threw open the door, and hardly moved beyond 
it ; " this is their hour's play : there they are, sir, 
of all ages and sizes, ay, and shapes too, though 
we keep the most helpless of the young, sitch as 
the blind and the hidiotic, on the other side of the 
house, as you saw. Some, you perceive, can hard- 
ly walk steadily, and others are big enough to be 
out and knocking about in the world for their- 
selves, instead of heating the bread of hidleness, 
which is the very 'best seconds' as they get here. 
There they are, my lad, and a greater pack of 
young wagabones there isn't to be found any 
where else in the world, I can safely say." 

"Where are their fathers and mothers?" asked 
little Ben, timidly, for he was almost afraid to j^ut 
a question to the man. 

" Fathers and mothers ! Lor' bless your hinno- 
cence, child ! why, the greater part — ay, two out 
of every three on 'em never knew sitch luxuries," 
answered the master, with a chuckle. " They're 
orphans — horphans in the fullest sense of the 
word" (for extra emphasis always involved an ex- 
tra aspiration with the master) ; " and even the 
parents of them as has got either a father or a 
mother ain't nothing to brag about, I can tell you, 
for they're either in the poor-house theirselves, or 
else they're able-bodied, and getting their shilling 



THE LOWEST 

a week and their gallon loaf outdoor relief the 
most on 'em." 

Uncle Benjamin couldn't help shrugging his 
shoulders and crying " God help 'em !" as the ut- 
ter helplessness of the young, born under such 
circumstances, fell upon his mind with even more 
terrible force than the helplessness of the old. 

"Ay, you may well say 'God 'elp 'em!' Master 
Franklin, for a greater set of young himps never 
wanted their hearts softened more than they do ; 
and, d'ye know, I verily believe, sir, that comfort- 
able places like this here hactually breed the very 
misery they're meant to give relief to — outdoor 
or indoor, as the case may be. Why, nearly half 
of these lads is fondlings, as they call theirselves ; 
for they're a great deal quicker at that there kind 
of knowledge, about fondlings, and foster-mothers, 
and sitch like, than they are at their hymn-books, 
I can tell you. A great many on 'em has been 
picked up by the city watchmen on door-steps or 
under gateways, and a goodish number been tied 
in fish-baskets to the knockers of houses ; and 
them as has been brought here in that there way, 
why, they have been born in the house itself, and 
are what the world falsely calls love children ; 
though a nice lot of love there must be about sitch 
mothers, I say, as can turn their backs upon their 
own flesh and blood as soon as the little things 
comes into the world, and never care to set eyes 
on 'em afterward, but, on the contrayry, throws 
the whole burden upon the parish and the re- 
spectable rate-payers — ay, and what's more, are 
as himperent to our beadle over it as if they'd a 
perfect right to make us a present of a whole col- 
ony." 

" Well, they don't seem to be very miserable, I 
must say," exclaimed young Ben, still harping on 
the most striking feature of all in such scenes. 
A A 



370 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANIvLIN. 

" Miserable !" echoed the poor-house master ; 
" why, you seem to be one of those persons, my 
boy, who come here with the notion that there 
will be nothing but tears and broken hearts to be 
seen from one end of the building to the other. 
Miserable !" he repeated, and then burst out 
laughing, as if there was something extremely 
comic in the idea. " Hem ! miserable, indeed ! 
No, no, my lad, all the misery in the world you'll 
find outside our gates. People don't come here 
to be miserable, I can tell you, but to be a great 
deal too well fed and taken care of, in my ojiinion. 
Just read our dietary table now, and you'll soon 
discover that there isn't much misery w^here j^eo- 
ple can have their three ounces of cooked meat 
without bone, and a pound of potatoes for dinner 
three times a week, besides a basin of excellent pea- 
soup — oh yes, you have tasted it. Friend Frank- 
lin — and potatoes and suet dumpling on the other 
days. Misery, indeed ! Yes, but it's good full- 
bellied, warm -backed, and well -housed misery 
though ; and there isn't a merrier set of young 
devil-may-cares than them same fatherless young 
himps here, I can tell you." 

" Come, come, now, friend," cried Uncle Ben, 
who could plainly see that his godson was being 
led astray by the harsh views of the hardened 
master, " steady, my boy, stead-ee, as they call to 
the helmsman. Do you mean to tell me" — and 
the old man kept shaking his forefinger as he said 
the words slowly and solemnly — "that when some 
parent or friend comes to visit some of the more 
lucky of these poor human waifs and strays, and 
there's a cry of 'Johnson wanted,' or 'Robertson 
wanted' (as I've heard go round the yard over 
and over again), do you mean to tell me that those 
boys, who know they haven't a friend in the 
world to come and see them, poor chicks — boys 



THE LOWEST " EUNGS" ON THE LADDER. 371 

who have never so much as set eyes perhaps on a 
parent's face, or known what a mother's smile is 
like — do you mean to say, man alive" — and Uncle 
Ben shook his finger violently close under the 
master's nose — "that such lads (quickened with 
the same heart and blood as you yourself), when 
they see the lucky Johnson, or Robertson, or son 
of somebody or other go skipping off to the re- 
ception-ward, and come back playing with his 
halfpenny, or laden with his half pint of nuts or 
his farthing popgun — do you mean to tell me, I 
say, that you haven't noted, as I have, the httle 
wretched, lonely, helpless, friendless things crowd 
moodily together, and look at one another with 
the same kind of powerless and bewildered air 
as one sees in a flock of sheep gathered outside 
a butcher's door ? Come, come, friend, you're 
straining the bow a little too hard — a little too 
hard." 

" Well, perhaps you're right, friend," rejoined 
the master, in a conciliatory tone. " You, as a 
stranger, I dare say, idill observe things that are 
lost upon old hands like us ; and one forgets, no 
doubt, that it's as remarkable a thing here for /i 
boy to have any friends at all, as it is for an out- 
of-doors boy to be without them ; so I shouldn't 
wonder, now I come to think of it, but the rarity 
of a father or mother may in such cases as you 
say make some of the young hurchins here feel 
the misery of having no one whom they can be- 
come chargeable to. Yes, that there must be 
hunpleasant to think of, certainly — not legally 
chargeable to any one. Besides, we all know," 
urged the master, as he endeavored to fall in with 
the tone of Uncle Benjamin, " how the boys at 
other schools always feel for the one who never 
goes home to see his friends in the holidays ; and 
so here, I dare say, the great wonder of the time 



372 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

is the boy who has got any friends to wish to see 
him, especially in a place, too, where there can't 
be any holidays, you know, from the simple fact 
that there are no homes to go to." 

" HoAV shocking !" shuddered Ben, with the 
sense of school and holidays fresh upon him ; "but 
I should like the poor boys better," he added, " if 
they seemed to feel their situation more, for real- 
ly they don't appear to me to care about it; so 
then I say to myself, If they don't care about it, 
why should J.?" 

"That's good, sound, sterhng sense, if yoii like, 
my boy !" added the master, approvingly ; and 
then, drawing the little fellow close up to him, he 
said, as he bent down and placed his head close 
beside young Ben's, "Now, you see all those lads 
there in the red worsted comforters, my child ?" 

" Yes," said young Ben ; and he was about to 
point toward them with his forefinger, but the 
master seized his hand as the boy was in the act 
of raising it. 

" Well, lad," went on the other, " the parish al- 
lowance in the shape of neck-tie to fasten the shirt 
collar is merely a j^iece of black cotton shoe-rib- 
bon, and that there red worsted comforter, to keep 
the throat and chest warm, has been bought by 
the friends of those boys who are lucky enough 
to have such a thing as a friend in the world ; so 
now you can jDick them out for yourself. Xo 
friends, no comforters — d'ye see ?" 

It was terrible for the little soft-hearted fellow 
to be able to realize the orphanage of such a mul- 
titude in so visible and massive a manner ; and as 
his eye wandered over the quadrangle, he kept 
saying to himself, " Comforters, fathers and moth- 
ers ! no fathers and mothers, no comforters !" 

" But I tell you, Friend Franklin, what is to my 
mind really the most dreadful thing by far in con- 



THE LOWEST " KUNGS ON THE LADDER. 373 

nection with this kind of life," the master proceed- 
ed, " and that is what we were talking about only 
the other day : that boys and girls brought up 
here have no idea of working in order to live. 
You know they see day after day — and, indeed, 
have seen ever since they first opened their eyes 
— some hundred or so of people regularly supplied 
with their rations, and that without having any 
thing to pay or any thing to do for the food. Do 
you know, I do verily believe, Friend Franklin, 
that 'mciny even of our hig boys here, and I'm sure 
almost all of our little ones, fancy that Nature 
sends breakfasts and suppers in the same way as 
she sends light and darkness ; and I'm nearly cer- 
tain, if some of our indoors boys were hard push- 
ed on the matter as to where bread or gruel came 
from, you'd find there was some vague idea in 
their minds that half-gallon loaves were dug up 
out of the ground, something in the same manner 
as they've seen the men, in their walks through 
the town, doing Avith the paving- stones in the 
streets ; and that gruel is as easily to be collected 
in tubfuls as the rain-water is caught for our 
washing." 

" What would they fancy a half guinea was, 
think you, if they were to be shown one ?" asked 
Uncle Ben, as he drew the bit of gold ouUu^f the 
wash-leather bag he carried in his pocket. 

" Well, 'pon my word I can't say. Friend Frank- 
lin. Farthings are great prizes here," returned 
the master, " and groats immense fortunes. But 
here ! come here ! you ' Monday.' ' Monday, I 
say,' " the master shouted, as he beckoned to one 
of the foundlings, who had been named after the 
day of the week on which he had been taken out 
of a hamper at the mail-coach ofhce. 

And when poor "Monday" had made his ap- 
pearance, and had been shown the bright yellow 



374 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

little disk of metal, and asked what he thought it 
was, he said, as he rubbed among the bristles of 
his scrubbing-brush crop of hair, and stood grin- 
ning as if he had been looking at a stale-tart tray 
for the first time in his life, " It ain't a farden, 
'cos I seed a farden once in Dobbs's hand, after 
his mother had been to see him, and she's got two 
and six a week, and half a gallon loaf outdoor, 
you know, sir, 'cos she takes in washing, and has 
the rheumatiz. No, no," and he shook his hand 
till you could almost fancy you heard it rattle, it 
seemed so empty, "it ain't thick enough, nor 
brown enough neither for a farden. Oh, I know 
noAV !" added the half-witted boy, looking up at 
the master, and grinning knowingly in his face. 

" Well, ' Monday,' Avhat is it, eh ?" asked the 
master, as sharp and quickly as a mail-coach 
guard calls " a'right." 

The lad grinned again for a minute or two be- 
fore answering, and then said, " AYhy, it's one of 
the brass buttons ofl' some charity-boy's leather 
breeches." 

Poor "Monday," whose life, ever since he had 
been taken out of his natal hamper, had been hem- 
med in by the four high brick walls of the poor- 
house, and who, had he heard by chance of the 
upper^middle, and lower classes of society, would 
have fancied it pointed out the distinction be- 
tween overseers, outdoors people, and indoors j^eo- 
ple — the poor lad was told " that would do," and 
"he might go ;" and directly his back was turned 
the master began rolling about in a very convul- 
sion of pent-up laughter, declaring he had never 
heard any thing half so funny in all his life. But 
Uncle Ben and even his little nephew saw in the 
worldly ignorance of poor " Monday" something- 
far too grave to be merry over ; so the godfather 
and the godson looked sorrowfully at each other, 










'It ain't a faulen, 'cos T seed d fdiclen once." 



THE LOWEST "EUNGS ON THE LADDEE. 377 

and each knew by the tenderness of the glance 
the thoughts that were stu'ring in the other's 
heart. 

" Oh, I'm wanted, I see, np in the infirmary. 
Ah ! I thought that port wine would be thrown 
away ! so you'll excuse me. Friend Franklin, will 
you ?" said the master, as he shook the other by 
the hand. "Drop in whenever you're passing, 
Avill you, for I shall always be glad to talk over 
these matters with you. Good-by, my fine little 
fellow ; good-by, friend ;" and, as Uncle Ben said 
something to him aside, he said, "Oh yes, of 
course I shall be happy to give you a letter to 
the governor. Good-by; I wouldn't leave you, 
but I have to see about the shell and things, you 
know." 

" Come along, Ben," cried the uncle, pulling his 
waistcoat down as the master hurried from them ; 
but, though the old man began to move, the lit- 
tle fellow seemed in no way disposed to follow. 
" Come, Ben, I say, there's the jail to see yet," he 
added, as he turned round and found the boy still 
in the same spot. 

The little fellow jerked his head as the uncle 
looked back at him. The old man understood 
tlie signal, and returned to the boy's side. 

" Whisper," said young Ben. 

The elder Benjamin stooped down and put his 
ear close to the lad's lips, and as he caught what 
the other said, the old man smiled to hear the 
words. 

" Oh, certainly," said Uncle Ben. 

The next minute the little fellow was scamper- 
ing after poor " Monday," and the minute after 
scampering back again to his imcle, who stood 
watching him at the gate. 

" Give me your hand, my little man," said the 
godfather to young Ben ; and, as the boy did so, 



378 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKUN. 

the old man shook it as if his heart was in his 
palm^ and then on the couple toddled — 
To the jail. 



CHAPTER XX. 

"lower and lower still." 

From the poor-house to the jail some think it 
is not a very great remove — at least some social 
topographers would have us believe so. 

But such people throw all the refuse of society 
together into one confused heap, which they call 
" the dangerous classes," and it is only your pick- 
ers-up of unconsidered trifles that pause to sepa- 
rate the rags from the bones. 

The agricultural poacher is not more distinct 
from the civic pickpocket than is the stock-pauper 
from the* stock-thief, or the dull-witted and half- 
fatuous beggar, for instance, from the cunning 
and adventurous sharper; and such is the caste 
and cliquery in even the '■^has "tnonde^^ that a 
" cracksman" would no more think of fraterniz- 
ing with a " shallow cove" than a barrister would 
dream of hobnobbing with an attorney, or even a 
" wholesale" venture to return the call of a " re- 
tail" in the petty circle of suburban exclusiveness. 

The jail that Uncle Ben took his godson to see 
was the jail proper. It had the fashionable gi- 
gantic stone gate, with festoons and tassels of fet- 
ters by way of ornamental work arranged over 
the doorway; and enormous unwieldy doors, 
knobbed over with square-headed nails as thickly 
as the sole of a navigator's boot, and punctuated 
with a couple of huge lions'-head knockers, that 
reminded one of the masks in a pantomime. The 
walls were as high as those of a racket-ground ; 



"LOWEK and lower still." S79 

and all along the top of them extended a long 
bristly-hog' s-mane, as it were, of chevavx defrise^ 
that looked like a hedge of bayonets. 

Uncle Ben and the boy were admitted through 
an opening in the larger gate, and went in, duck- 
ing their heads under the aperture somewhat aft- 
er the manner of fowls entering a hen-roost. 

" Lett'r for th' gov'nor," shouted the military- 
looking gate-keeper, in a sharp military tone, as 
he handed the note Uncle Ben had brought Avith 
him to a stray warder, or turnkey as they were 
called in those days. 

The official disappeared with the document, 
and the old man and the boy were asked to step 
into the gate-room Avhile they awaited the answer. 

" Just look, uncle," said the lad, in a whisper, 
as he entered the place almost Avith fear and 
trembling, "just look at the blunderbusses and 
cutlasses all chained together up there" — there 
were several rows of the clumsy brass-barreled 
pieces and knobby-handled swords arranged over 
the fireplace — " and look at the lot of handcuffs 
and irons too ; just look how tastily they're ar- 
ranged — all over the walls, I declare ;" and he 
wheeled round and round, taken with the set pat- 
terns and bright glitter of the well-polished man- 
acles, that had been embroidered, as it were, into 
all kinds of lineal devices on every side of the 
cell-like lodge. There were swivel handcuffs, that 
looked like big horses' bits, and close-linked chains, 
like horses' curbs ; the one strung after the fash- 
ion of keys on enormous rings, and the other hang- 
ing in great hanks like so much iron yarn. The 
upper part of the walls, again, were garlanded 
round with leg-irons and ankle-cuffs; and there 
were iron neck-pieces that were like heavy muffin- 
tins, and iron waistbands that were almost as 
thick as the ring to an Indiaman's anchor. Some 



380 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

of the human harness seemed to have been made 
— so massive was the style of ironmongery — for 
the renowned race of Cornish giants ; for a few 
of the manacles were literally as large as the han- 
dle to a navigator's spade, while others, again, 
were such mere miniature things that they look- 
ed positively as if they were meant for babies, be- 
ing no bigger in compass than a little girl's brace- 
let, though twenty times heavier ; and the sight 
of these set one thinking either that the juvenile 
offenders must be very strong and desperate, or 
the jailers very pusillanimous and weak. 

" Oh my !" cried Ben, as he made the tour of 
the room, and halted in front of an enormous long- 
pole, with an immense crutch covered with leath- 
er at the end of it, and which had somewhat the 
appearance of a Brobdignagian pitchfork ; " what 
ever can that be for, uncle ?" 

The gate-keeper, standing at the door, over- 
heard the question, and turned round for a minute 
to explain the use of the article. " That, my lad," 
said the man, as he kept his eyes still fixed on 
the door while he spoke, and broke off every now 
and then to answer the gate, " is to prevent any 
of the prisoners injuring the officers in their cells. 
'Casionally, you see, the fellors gets furious when 
they're locked up alone in the 'fractory ward, and 
swears they'll stick us with their knives, or beat 
our skulls in with their hammock-rings if we only 
chance to go in to them ; and we can see by their 
looks as they means it, too. Well, in such cases, 
one of us puts on that great big shield you see 
there," and the officer pointed to a leathern disk 
larger in diameter than the largest target. "It's 
as big round as a man's high, and made of basket- 
work, and well padded, and covered with buffalo 
hide. So, when the officer sees his opportunity, 
he dashes into the cell with that there thrust out 



"LOWER AND LOWER STILL." 381 

in front of him, and covering his whole body. 
This takes the chap aback a bit, and before he can 
recover hisself another officer darts in, holding 
out that long pole there, with the padded crutch 
at the end of it, and with that he makes a drive 
at the fellor, and j)ins him round the body close 
again the wall; and then another officer, armed 
with that there smaller crutch, rushes on directly 
after the other, and pinions the chap's legs in the 
same manner. So, when they've got the fellor 
fast and tight, then all the other officers in the 
prison pours in, and overpowers him altogether. 
TJiat is what that pretty-looking little happyra- 
tus is for, my young gentleman." 

Young Benjamin, who had been staring with 
the same sapient, round-eyed kind of expression 
as an owl in a bird-cage all the time the man had 
been speaking, merely said " Oh !" when the sto- 
ry was ended, and wondered whether, if poor half- 
witted " Monday" ever got in there, he'd be man- 
acled, and fettered, and pitch-forked like the rest. 

By this time a warder returned, and putting 
his hand to his cap, saluted the elder Benjamin in 
military fashion as he said, partly to the gate- 
keeper and partly to the gentleman himself, "Pass 
two — 'spect prison — gov'nor's orders." Then 
beckoning the gate-keeper to one side, the officer 
seemed to take the ramrod out of his back while 
he said in a whisper, " You'll find a half gallon 
of rum, Bennet" (and he winked as rapidly as a 
bird at the man), "at the bottom of the bread 
when it comes in this evening ; just pass it for 
me, will you, and you shall have your regulars. 
I'll square it with you by-and-by." Then sudden- 
ly turning round and assuming the military air 
again, he cried, " Now, sir, pliz foller me — 'spect 
prison." 

The man, who wore many heavy keys chained 



382 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

round his waist, was about to apply one of them 
to a huge lock (as big as a family Bible), and to 
open a gate in a thick trellis-work of iron railings 
that was as ponderous as a portcullis, when Uncle 
Ben suggested that he wished more particularly 
to see the boys' part of the prison, saying that 
the master of the poor-house had told him that 
their new Quaker governor was beginning to try 
and keep the juvenile from the old offenders. 

" Yezzir — all stuff, though — never carry it out 
— ^new-fangled nonsense ; been here twenty year, 
I have — been together all my time, they have — 
no harm came of it, as I can see. Nothing like 
dis'pline — stric' dis'pline; yezzir — that's all we 
want here, sir — dis'pline — stric' dis'pline." 

Then putting his two hands to the heavy gate 
he had been standing at while he jerked out the 
above speech, he made it moan again as he turned 
it slowly on its hinges. 

Ben was now in a kind of bird-cage of iron 
bars ; and another gate, with another huge family- 
biblical lock, had to be undone before he entered 
the paved yard of the prison itself 

Once within the precincts, the place was like a 
fortress, with its heavy blocks of buildings and 
embrasure-like windows^ all radiating from the 
"argus," or governor's house in the centre, like 
the threads of a gigantic spider's web done in 
brick-work. The doors to the different prison 
wings were as massive as those of an iron safe, 
while each of the different "airing-yards" was 
railed off like the entrance to some gloomy and 
desolate inn of court. 

The warder and the visitors passed on to the 
oakum-room, which had been built across the end 
of the large triangular space between the last two 
prison wings, or rather the last two bricken spokes 
of the architectural wheel. This room consisted 



"lower and lower still. 383 

of a long barn-like shed, fitted with seats, which 
ranged from one end of the lengthy out-house to 
the other, and which stood on a slightly-inclined 
plane, so that altogether it had somewhat the ap- 
pearance of a rude stand run up for the nonce at 
a race-course. The air here was charged with the 
true prison perfume, and reeked as strongly of the 
tarry and hempen odor of rope-yarn mixed with 
a whiff of stale cocoa, gruel, and pea-soup, as a 
circus smells of oranges and saw-dust. 

Hei-* were some hundred of mere children, 
ranged along the forms, each Avith a hook tied 
just above the knee, and "fiddling away," as the 
prison phrase ran, at a small thread of the un- 
raveled junk ; that is to say, sawing it backward 
and forward across the hook, and then rolling the 
loosened strand to and fro along their thigh, where 
the trowsers seemed to be coated with glue, from 
the tar with which they had become covered. 
The whole atmosphere within the room was hazy 
as that of the interior of a mill with the dust of 
the abraded tow flying in the air. A death-like, 
catacomb-like silence reigned throughout the 
place, and round the shed sat a small detachment 
of prison officials, perched at intervals on high, 
lawyer's-clerk-like stools, watching the lads at 
work, while here and there upon the walls hung 
black-boards covered with Scripture texts, such as, 

"I will arise and go to my Father, and 
SAT unto him. Father, I have sinned against 
Heaven and before thee." 

And " Set a watch, O Lord, before mt 
mouth, and keep the door of my lips," etc., 
etc. 

As the trio entered the shed, the whole of the 
boys rose in a body to salute them, and each put 
his hand across his forehead like a person shading 
his eyes as he looks up on a bright sunrty day. 



394 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANItLIN. 

They then sat down immediately afterward, 
the one simultaneous movement sounding like 
the breaking of a huge wave upon the sea- 
shore. 

" Hard labor pris'nus, sir, most of 'em !" said 
the chief warder, still jerking out the information 
in the same snappy tone as if he were giving the 
word of command. " B'ys all in gray, Sum'ry 
b'ys,"* went on the communicant, with his chin 
in the air as before. " B'ys in gray, with yeller 
collus to weskets, Seshuns b'ys ;f and b'ys^ln blue 
here on lower fo'm, Mis'meenuns."J 

Little Ben hardly heard the words, and the un- 
cle cared not to inquire into the precise niceties 
of the legal distinctions. 

The boy was rapt — entranced — stunned, as it 
were, with the utter novelty of the place and 
scene before him. He had heard talk of robbers, 
and had certainly read of Robin Hood and his 
band of freebooters in Sherwood forest, but he 
had never seen more than the back of a thief in 
all his life before, and that was when an alarm had 
been raised in their street one night, and he had 
caught sight, on throwing open his window, of a 
troop of watchmen hurrying along in chase of a 
nimble pair of legs in the distance. Still, to the 
lad, there had always been a world of vague ter- 
ror in the mere idea of such characters. He had 
formed an imaginative picture of wild, lawless 
ruffianism, and cut-throat, ogrish propensities and 
appearance in connection with the predatory class 

* Summary boys, i. e., those -who had been summarily 
committed by magistrates without being sent to the sessions 
for trial. 

t Anglice, Sessions boys, or those who had been tried and 
convicted of larceny or felony at the sessions. 

X Properly called "Misdemeanants," or boys that were 
imprisoned for some misdemeanor; that is to say, that had 
not committed any theft or serious offense. 



"lower and lower still." 385 

in general, and this had often, when the window- 
sashes of his bed-chamber rattled in their frames, 
caused him to lie and tremble in his bed by the 
horn- ; so that now, the ntter difference between 
the real and the ideal positively confounded him. 
Could it be that the little children before him were 
really thieves — little mannikin things like them — 
that were not only the very opposite in appearance 
to ogres, cut-throats, and ruffians, but mere babies 
most of them, and who seemed to require a nurse 
rather than a jailer to watch over them ? Was 
it for the safe custody of such mere Tom Thumb 
creatures as these that the half-military prison of- 
ficials went about, with those heavy bunches of 
keys chained round their waist ? Was it for these 
wretched toddlekins, who seemed to need a go- 
cart instead of a prison van to bring them to the 
jail, that the cutlasses Avere chained up over the 
mantel -piece in the gate -room, and those tiny, 
baby-handcuffs kept, ever ready, hanging against 
the walls ? Did those little hands, that had hard- 
ly outgrown their dimples for knuckles, need a 
fortress to resist them ? did they want iron doors 
as heavy as sepulchre-stones, and iron bars and 
bolts as thick as musket-barrels, and walls as 
high as cliffs, to keep them from breaking prison ? 
What could it all mean ? Surely, he thought, as 
he turned it over and over, it must be the mad- 
house that his uncle had brought him to, so as to 
have a bit of fun with him, and see whether he'd 
know the sane from the insane. Yet no ! What 
could those poor boys be there for, if the men in 
authority over them were really so many lunatics ? 
Could they be the poor idiot lads that the grown 
maniacs were allowed to play the fool with ? It 
really seemed to be so. But no, no ; the little 
fellows hadn't the idiot look with them, like the 
wretched silly boys he had seen in the poor-house. 
Be 



3^ YOUNG BENJAMIN PEANKLIN. 

Besides, the warder himself had called it a prison. 
What coiilcl it all mean ? 

Then poor bewildered little Ben began, as the 
whirl and confusion in his brain, and the singing 
of the blood in his ears subsided a little, to glance 
his eye fitfully along the forms, and notice the 
features of such lads as had resumed their work, 
after having had their fill of staring at himself. 
He could see no difference in their looks from his 
old playmates at Mr. Brownwell's school. Some 
one or two were positively prettj'' lads — good-look- 
ing in the literal sense of the term — and seemed, 
despite the ugly gray prison dress, to have faces 
beaming with frankness and innocence. Others 
certainly looked dogged and sullen, and many had 
a sharp, knowing, and half-sly expression, with a 
curl at the corners of their mouth and a twinkle 
in their eye, as if they were ready to bm'st into 
laughter on the least occasion ; but not one conld 
he see that had that sinister averted scowl, and 
those heavy, bull-dog-like features that were made 
to characterize the thieves in the pictures of some 
of his schoolfellows' books. "Were these, then, 
really thieves before him — little baby felons and 
convicts in pinafores? Yet still he fancied he 
must have misunderstood his imcle somehow. 
Why, there was one poor child there in gray, 
with a yellow collar to his waistcoat, that wasn't 
bigger than little Teddy Holmes, his sister Ruth's 
eldest boy ; and Teddy was only just turned five, 
he knew. They could never have tried him^ and 
made a convict of such a mere babe as he was; 
for, if they made felons of little things of five years 
old, why not at four, at three — or, indeed, why 
should the baby in long clothes go free, if it came 
to that ? How could such a mere infant as that 
lad possibly know right from wrong, any more 
than Tommy, their cat at home ? — and he really 
was a dreadful thief, if you liked. 



"LOWER AND LOWER STILL." 38T 

But poor young Ben's speculations and bewil- 
derment were soon put an end to by his uncle 
asking the chief warder what was the character 
of the offense for which the misdemeanants — the 
boys in blue on the lower form — had been impris- 
oned. 

" Stan' up, mis'meenuns," cried the chief ward- 
er, as if he had been drilling a body of privates. 

The boys rose in a row as though they had been 
all hoisted by their necks at one pull ; and there 
they stood, with their hands straight down by 
their sides, and their chins cocked in the air, the 
very monkey mimicry of the antics of the chief 
warder himself. 

" What a' yer in for, b'y ?" squirted out the 
officer, addressing the first lad in the rank. 

" Heaving a highster-shell through a street- 
lamp, please, sir," was the urchin's rej^ly. 

Ben stared at his uncle as the answer fell upon 
his ear. 

" In thri times afore," added the officer, by way 
of comment. " The b'y did it to get a month's 
food an' shelter, dussay." 

" An' you ?" went on the warder, passing to the 
next. 

" Please, sir, a woman said I hit her babby," 
whined out this one. 

" An' you ?" the warder continued, running 
down the rank. 

" Heaving clay about, please, sir," responded 
the next. 

" In fo'teen times afore," the officer threw in, 
as a commentary on the character of this lad. 

"It's been mostly for cadging (begging), please, 
sir," expostulated the brat, " and only two times 
for prigging, please, sir." 

" Sil'ns, b'y. Nex' b'y go on," shouted the man 
in authority. 



388 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

" Heaving stones," said Xo. 4. 

" Threatening to stab another boy, please, sir," 
cried the lad after No. 4, as the warder pointed 
to him. 

" Prigging a bell in a garding, please, sir," ex- 
claimed No. 6. 

" Heaving stones, sir," went on No. 7. 

" Heaving stones too," No. 8 said. 
'In fur times afore," again interposed the 
warder. 

" Heaving stones," ejaculated No. 9. 

"The same," answered No. 10. 

And there the file ended. 

" Heaving stones ! Heaving stones ! Heaving 
stones !" The words echoed and echoed again in 
young Ben's brain ; and then, in the natural sym- 
pathy and justice of his little heart, he cried aloud, 
" Oh, uncle ! do they put these poor little fellows 
among thieves, and lock them up in this horrid 
place, and make them wear that ugly prison-dress, 
for such mere child's ^\aj as that? Isn't it a 
shame ! Why, there wasn't a boy at our school 
that shouldn't have been here, then, if all were 
punished alike. Oh, isn't it a shame — a wicked 
shame !" he repeated. " Why, I remember my- 
self," and the lad was pouring forth a torrent of 
generous boyish indignation, and would have run 
on for heaven knows how long, hadn't the chief 
warder cut him short with one of his peculiar ex- 
plosive commands in the shape of 

" Sil'ns, sir, pliz. Can't allow such remuks as 
them in pressuns of pris'nus." 

Young Ben was tongue-tied in an instant, and 
he drew up close to his uncle's side, for he hardly 
knew whether, if " heaving clay about" was pun- 
ishable with imprisonment, he too mightn't have 
rendered himself liable to be locked up by what 
he had said. 



"lower and lower still." 389 

"Xow," exclaimed Uncle Ben to the warder, 
" let's hear the offenses of some of the others." 

" Stan' up, you b'y, ther'," shouted the officer, 
addressing the first of the lads in gray seated on 
the next form. 

The boy shot up from his seat in an instant as 
sharply and suddenly as a Jack in the box on the 
removal of the lid, and stood as stiff as a dummy 
in the window of a " youth's fashionable clothing 
mart." 

" H'ould a' yer, b'y ?" said the jailer, question- 
ing the lad first as to his age. 

" Thirteen year, please, sir," was the answer. 

" What a' yer in for?" 'went on the laconic turn- 
key. 

" Coat and umbereller, i^lease, sir," the little fel- 
low replied, with a faint smile ; and then added, 
as if he knew what would be the next query, 
"This makes seven times here, please, sir, and 
three times at the Old Hoss, please, sir." 

The " Old Horse" was the cant name for the 
next county jail. 

"Hollong ha' yer got this time?" demanded 
the warder, so as to make him state the term of 
his imprisonment. 

"Three calendar, please, sir" {Anglice^ three 
calendar months) . " This makes four times, please, 
sir, as I've had to do three calendar," said the lad ; 
" and I've had two two-monthses as well — one of 
the two-monthses here, and one at the Old Hoss, 
please, sir ; and I've done one six weeks and two 
two-dayses besides. It's mostly been for prig- 
ging, please, sir," added the young urchin. 

Little Ben stared with amazement at his uncle 
as he heard the confession, uttered as it was with- 
out the faintest tinge of shame to color the cheeks, 
ay, and (what struck him as still more strange) 
without the least quake of fear, even though the 
warder stood at the boy's elbow. 



390 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

*' Woddid yer tek ?" shot out the official, now 
drawing the lad out as to the kind of articles he 
had been in the habit of stealing. 

" I took a watch and chain wunst, please, sir, 
and I did a pair of goold bracelets another time," 
was the unabashed and half-exulting reply. " I 
frisked a till twice'd ; and this time it's for the coat 
and umbereller, as I told you on afore. One of 
the two-dayses I had was for a bottle of pickles, 
but that was three or four year ago." 

"Why, I beginned thieving about four year 
ago," he went on, in answer to another question 
from the officer, who seemed as j^leased as the boy 
himself with the examination. "I went out with 
a butcher-boy. He's got seven year on it now, 
please, sir. He sent me into the shop with a bit 
of a hold seal to sell, when I prigged the stooj^" 
(stole the watch) ; " and I tried on the same 
dodge when I did the pair of goold bracelets." 

"Have you got any father, my lad?" asked 
Uncle Ben, with a hitch in his breath. 

" Yes, please, sir," the answer ran. " Mother 
mends glass and chayney, please, sir," and father's 
in the consumptive hospital down in the country. 
I don't mean to go out prigging no more, please, 
sir," added the youngster, as he suddenly lowered 
his eyelids with affected penitence, "not if I can 
get any other work that'll keep me, I won't."* 

"Won' do, b'y!" cried the inexorable warder; 
" yer pitched that ther' tale to the lady as went 
over the pris'n las' time we had yer here ; an' 
then yer got three calen'ar the second day after 
yer went out." 

* There is no fiction in the above answers of the boys. 
These, and those ^yhich follow, are simply the replies of the 
young thieves at the boys' prison in Westminster, which were 
taken down verbatim by the author at the time of his visit 
to Tothill Fields' House of Correction in the year 1856. 



"lower and lower still. 391 

Little Ben was heart-stricken with what he 
heard. It was all so new to him — so startling — 
so shameless — so frank, and yet so subtle — so 
heartless, and yet so knowing ; in a word, it was 
so utterly unlike all his preconceptions concern- 
ing robbers and thieves, that, now that he was 
really convinced he was standing in the presence 
of a host of boy-felons, he felt sick and half scared 
with the terrible consciousness of the fact. 

There was such a sense of massiveness in the 
large array of crime before him, that, now the boy 
had learned that the greater part of the mere 
children were there for thefts as brazen-faced as 
those which the urchin of thirteen had just con- 
fessed to, he was fairly appalled with the vastness 
of the vice. Few, indeed, know what it is to see 
crime in the mass — wickedness in the lump, as it 
were ; to look U20on some hundred heads, and feel 
as if they were fused into one monster brain, in- 
stinct with a hundred devil-power, and quickened 
Avith a hundred fold niore than ordinary human 
cunning and cheatery. Most people know crime 
only as an exceptional thing ; they hear, read of, 
or become personally acquainted with merely in- 
dividual cases, and never see it in such huge con- 
glomerates — such immense corporate bodies of 
devilry as give the mind a foretaste of the con- 
crete wickedness of Pandemonium itself. It is no 
longer one wayward human heart we contemplate, 
but hundreds of such hearts, every one of them 
pulsing like a hundred clocks in terrible unison, 
throbbing with one universal rancor and hatred 
of all that is good and grand, and never a gener- 
ous passion nor a noble sentiment, and hardly a 
kindly feeling stirring Avithin them. Crime seen 
under such circumstances seems to be as much a 
part of the " ordinations of nature" as even grav- 
itation itself, and a sense of destiny and fatalism 
almost overpowers the souk 



392 YOUNG BEXJAiinT FEANKLIN. 

As for poor little Ben, there was such a kind 
of rattlesnake fascination in the terror that was 
on him, that he couldn't, for the life of him, take 
his eyes off* the lad who had just sat down. 

The boy was a sharp-featured and sly-looking 
youngster of about Ben's own height, and had a 
pucker and twitter about the corners of his mouth 
which showed, despite his downcast look, that, 
though pretended penitence was on his eyelids, 
incipient laughter was on his lips. Indeed, he 
needed but to have the prison garb exchanged 
for the man's coat, with the tails dragging on the 
ground, and the trowsers tied up over the shoul- 
ders with string instead of braces, and the bare 
muddy feet too, to mark him as one of the con- 
firmed young street-vagabonds that are to be 
found in every city. Were these the poor little 
human waifs and strays of the town, that Ben 
had so often seen collected at the entrances to 
the courts and alleys about the neighborhood ? he 
asked himself, without shaping the thoughts into 
words. Were these the slij^s and cuttings that, 
after being duly inoculated and planted, and trans- 
planted into the hot-bed prison soils, were des- 
tined to bear the felon fruit ? As the light burst 
through the parting clouds of his brain, his mind's 
eye grew half dazed with the flash. 

He looked again and again at the lad, and tried 
if he could read innate wickedness branded like 
the mark of Cain upon his brow. But no ! The 
boy-thief, now that he came to gaze at him well, 
was the very image of Bob Cooper, who was the 
kindest and best-natured boy of them all at Mr. 
Brownwell's school. Then the recollection that 
the father of the young thief was in the hospital, 
and the mother out all day mending "chayney 
and glass," came stealing over his heart, as soft 
and genial as the warm south wind on a winter's 



393 

day ; and as his nature melted, young Ben thought, 
what would that boy-thief have been had he been 
blessed with friends and counselors like himself? 
and what might he himself have become had the 
same iron circumstances cradled his childhood? 
The thought once in the little fellow's brain, and he 
looked upon the crowd of boy-thieves before him 
through the liquid lens of j^ity flooding his eyes. 

" Stan' up, nex' b'y !" again snapped out the 
prison official. 

This boy knew by the questions put to the pre- 
vious one the kind of information he had to give ; 
so, directly he was on his feet, he put his hands 
straight down by his side, and raising his chin, 
and looking directly before him, he delivered him- 
self of the following statement, almost in one 
breath, and certainly in one sentence : 

Sixteen year old please sir and in for a stealing 
a coat I've been a prigging about four year I 
done one calendar here for a pair of boots and 
four calendar at the Old Hoss for prigging a tray 
of silver pencil-cases the way as I prigged that 
there was this here I took a hold aypenny ring and 
broke it up and went into a shoj) to ax whether it 
were goold or not and while the gennelman was 
a looking at it I slips the tray of pencil-cases un- 
der my coat then I got took for two bundles of 
cigars and did another month here after that I 
was took for some meresome pipes and had an- 
other month on it here I was took for a coat be- 
sides and done my three calendar at the Old 
Hoss again for that father's a hingineer and I 
ain't got no mother please sir and that's all." 

" Wait, boy !" cried Uncle Ben, as he saw the 
lad about to resume his seat ; " what do you mean 
to do when you leave here ?" 

"Do !" echoed the young thief, as if he was 
astonished at such a question being put to him. 



394 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

" Yes, lad," repeated the elder Benjamin ; " what 
do you mean to do ?" 

" Why, when I gets out here I shall go prigging 
again, in coorse," was the candid and fearless re- 
ply of the lad, as he looked the warder full in the 
face. 

"But why," inquired the old man, "why will 
you thieve rather than work, lad ?" 

" Why, 'cos I don't know no other way of get- 
ting a living honestly," he answered, with an ill- 
used air. 

The odd blunder set every one in the prison 
laughing, officers and all, except the head turnkey 
himself, and he merely shouted out, 

" Sil'ns, b'ys ! we can't ha' no laughing here !" 
and when the place was quiet, the warder added 
as before, " Stan' up, nex' b'y." 

" Been fourteen times in prison," began the lad 
of his own accord, as he rose from his seat. " I've 
had three calendar in this here prison four times, 
and one fourteen-days, and I don't know how 
many two-monthses and one-monthses besides." 

Uncle Benjamin could no longer bear to hear 
the boys recount their several imprisonments 
with all the glory with which an old soldier fights 
his " battles o'er again," so he cut this lad's state- 
ment short by asking what alone the old man 
cared to know. " And when you leave this prison, 
you'll begin thieving again, I suppose ?" 

" No, I ain't a-going this time," answered the 
lad, in a dogged tone. 

" Indeed !" exclaimed the old man. 

"No," went on the other; "I means to hook 
it, and go to sea." 

It was now time to pass from the salient de- 
tails of the foreground into the broad masses and 
deeper tones.of the general view. So Uncle Ben 
began to inquire as to ages rather than the crim- 



"lower and LOWEK still." 395 

inal histories of the different boy-prisoners, for he 
knew that the mere years of the children impris- 
oned there would tell a far sadder tale than they 
themselves could recount. 

" What is the age of the youngest prisoner you 
have here, officer ?" said he, addressing himself to 
the head turnkey. 

" Fi' ye'rs," exploded the official, with all the 
callousness of true routine. " Stan' up, you Tom 
Tit there," he cried, addressing the child by the 
nickname he had got in the prison ; and imme- 
diately a little head of short-cropped hair popped 
up at the back of some of the bigger boy-thieves 
in the front row. " Ther', get on the form, do, 
and let's see you a bit," added the chief w^arder. 

The mannikin scrambled up on the bench as 
he was ordered ; and little Ben shuddered as he 
saw the mere babe stand there grinning in the 
felon's suit of gray, that hung about him like a 
sick man's clothes. 

" Secon' time o' being here," went on the disci- 
plinarian. " In for stealing — what's yer 'fense ?" 
he asked, sharply. 

The child grinned-again as he lisped out, " Frith- 
king a till, pleathe." 

" Woddid yer tek ?" demanded the other. 

" Five bob and a tanner, thir," was the urchin 
thief's reply. 

" Fi' and sixpuns, he means," went on the of- 
ficer, acting as a glossary to the baby's slang. 
" Ther', that'll do ; stan' down. That's the youn- 
gest we've had for some time. But I've knowed 
a child o' six sent to the hulks, I have, though he 
cud hardly say ' not g'i'tty' when he was tried." 

Uncle Ben wouldn't trust himself to speak 
upon such a matter in such a place, so he bit his 
lips to keep back the w^ords that ^ere burning 
for utterance at the tip of his tongue ; and he 



39G YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

frowned and shook his head at his little godson 
as he saw the boy, in his indignation, scowling 
and making mouths at the -warder before him. 

" Want th' ages of so' more, sir, eh ?" the official 
asked ; and as the uncle gave a nod in reply, he 
cried, 

" None here eight ye'r old — nor nine ; let's see," 
the man said, talking to himself — " ten's the nex' 
youngest we got— ^isn't it, Corrie ?" he inquired 
of one of the other warders near him. 

The man addressed shot up from his seat as he 
replied " Yezzir !" in a voice that made the place 
echo again as with the report of a pistol. 

" Stan' lip now, all ten-ye'r b'ys," shouted out 
the head turnkey, authoritatively ; and the words 
were no sooner uttered than the lads rose from 
different parts of the room. " Ther' they a', sir," 
he added — " one ! two ! three ! four ! five ! Fi' 
ten-ye'r b'ys, and three on them in once afore; 
others firs' 'fense b'ys." 

" What are they here for ?" Uncle Ben sought 
to learn. 

" What a' yer in for ?" said the man, pointing 
first to the one nearest at hand, and then to the 
others, while the answers of the lads ran success- 
ively thus : *' Pick-pocketing — stealing brass — 
stealing seven razors — taking tui^pence — spinning 
a top." 

" What's that ?" asked Uncle Ben; "surely that 
lad didn't say he was here for spinning a top ?" 

" Yezzir ; reg'lar 'fense, that ! a boy gets one 
calendar for it, if he's took up for 'structing the 
king's highway, sir;" such was the information 
that came like a thunder-clap upon the two Ben- 
jamins ; and the younger couldn't help throwing 
up his little honest hands, and tossing his good- 
natured head^ in the depth of his pity for the poor 
little sufiering things before him. 



''LOWER AND LOWER STILL." 39T 

" Stan' up all'leven-ye'r b'ys,now," was the next 
order; and when it had been obeyed, his man pro- 
ceeded to tell them off with his fingers as before. 
" Sev'n b'ys here !" then he said, " One in ten times 
afore ; another six times ; another five ; the res' 
stranjus and firs' 'fense b'ys ?" 

Uncle Ben nodded ; and again the warder cried, 
" What a' yer in for, b'y ?" and went pointing to 
the lads in succession, and drawing from them 
the following answers, one after another, as he 
did so: 

" Taking a silver kettle — stealing pigeons — spin- 
ning a top (the two Benjamins again looked at 
each other) — begging — killing a dog — sleeping in 
the public gardens (another exchange of glances) 
— steaUng a tray^of goold rings." 

" Now twel'-ye'r old b'ys, sir, eh ?" again in- 
quired the warder ; and, as the uncle nodded 
again, up shot ten more boys, and their offenses 
were found, in the same manner as before, to have 
been " pickpocketing — stealing a coat — pawning 
a jacket — stealing lead — pickpocketing — stealing 
meat — breaking a window — stealing a goold watch 
and chain — stealing bread" — ("You didn't want 
it, b'y, eh ?" " Oh no, sir ; meant to sell it") was 
the parenthetical inquiry and answer) — " and steal- 
ing brass." 

And when all the offenses had been stated, the 
warder added, by way of comment, " Pickpockets 
here all old hands. One in six times afore. On'y 
two stranjus 'mong the whole twel' b'ys. See any 
mo', sir?''* 

Uncle Ben shook his head, and then said " Stay" 
as he cast his eyes upon the ground. " Yes," he 
went on, " I should like to know how many of the 

* The remarks made in the note to page 390 apply also 
to the above statements. They are matters. of fact rather 
than imagination. 



398 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

boys here have no fathers or mothers to take care 
of them." 

The words were hardly out of the old man's 
mouth before the warder had made the building 
ring with the command of " Stan' up, b'ys with 
no fathers and mothers !" and then, as he saw one 
lad rising whose parents he knew to be living, 
he bawled out, *' What a' yer doing there, b'y ? 
You're not a no father an' mother !" 

" Please, sir," cried the lad in return, " I'm a no 
mother, sir — I got a step, please, sir." 

" Well, si' down, then ! It'll come to yer turn 
nex' ;" and as the lad did as he was bidden, the 
warder went on counting again, and ended by 
saying, "Ther' they a', sir. Fi' no fathers an' 
mothers." 

" Five utterly destitute !" muttered Uncle Ben, 
as he felt his heart drop like a stone in his bo- 
som. His little godson stared at him with all the 
bewilderment of utter horror, for he knew well 
what was passing in the old man's mind. 

" Now, sir, I s'pose you'll take the b'ys with a 
father or a mother on'y, eh ?" suggested the offi- 
cial ; and, as he saw the other nod assent once 
more, he bellowed out the order ; but such a mul- 
titude of young ones rose at the word of com- 
mand that the Avarder knew half of them had mis- 
taken the summons. So he kejDt shouting to those 
he was in doubt about, "i^ow, b'y, a' yer a father 
or a mother, eh?" whereupon the urchin would 
answer either that he was " a mother" or " a fa- 
ther," as it might happen, or else that he Avas 
" both a father and mother too ;" in which latter 
case he would be told to " si' down and pay more 
'tention, or he'd get in the 'fract'ry cell if he didn 
mind." 

" Ther' they a', sir, at last," again cried the man in 
authority. " Fifteen no father ! Twel' no mother !" 



"lower and lower still." 399 

"Please, sir, my father and mother's supper- 
ated," shouted one of the bigger boys; "and 
mine's in the poor'us, please, sir," cried another ; 
"and mine's gone to sea;" "and my mother's 
been in the 'ospital for the last year with dickey" 
(decay) " of the thigh-bone ;" and so they went 
on, each shouting out after the other, as if they 
fancied some wrong had been done to them in 
not being allowed to stand uj) as orphans beside 
the others. 

" Sil'ns !" shouted the warder ; " we can't ha' 
this kere !" 

Uncle Ben went up to the official, and said 
thoughtfully, " I want to find out how many of 
these boys have got relatives in prison." 

" Oh, a'most all on 'em, sir," was the laconic re- 
ply; "regular jail-birds, greater part on 'em; but 
I'll see, sir, an' let you know." 

It cost the official some trouble to make the 
lads understand what they really had to answer ; 
and the warder had to put the question to them 
in their own peculiar terms, as to whether their 
family or friends were " flats or sharps" (^. e., hon- 
est or dishonest people) ; and then, as some mis- 
understanding arose, the urchins would cry out, 
" Please, sir, my father an't a sharp, he's a flat, 
sir — an't never been in pris'n in his life." Other 
lads, too, would call out that their mother was a 
cadger (a beggar), and want to know what the 
gennelman would say that there was — a flat or a 
sharp ; while others shouted out that they had 
got a brother who was a "gun" (2.6., thief). 

However, at last the warder had settled the 
matter ; and as he told the numbers off", he shout- 
ed in his usual official tone, " Five got fathers in 
prison ! One, father at hulks ! Three, mothers 
in prison! Twenty-six got brothers in prison! 
Four got brothers at hulks ! Two, sisters in 



400 YOUNG BENJA3IIN FRANKLIN. 

prison ! Three, cousins in j^rison ! Two, cousins 
at hulks ! One, uncle in j^rison ! One, uncle at 
hulks ! One, aunt in prison ! And now all's told, 
sir." 

" But one more question," said Uncle Ben, sor- 
rowfully, " and I have done. How many of the 
parents of these boys, who have got fathers and 
mothers, are habitual drunkards ?"* 

The question was clearly put and clearly under- 
stood, and the statements duly checked by the 
attendant warders, who, from the repeated return 
of the greater part of the lads to those quai'ters, 
knew pretty well the family history of most of 
those under their charge ; and the answer proved 
to be that twenty -five boys, at least, in every 
hundred, were rendered even worse than father- 
less by the brutal sotting of their parents. 

Poor Uncle Ben, in his desire to read his little 
godson a lesson, had given himself a severer lec- 
ture than he had expected. He was touched to 
the very quick of his own kindly nature, and stood 
for a moment with his chin on his bosom and his 
eyes on the ground, as if stricken down Avith 
shame. Then his lips moved quickly, though he 
uttered not a word, and he locked the knuckles 
of one hand in the palm of the other, as he flung 
his eyes for an instant upAvard. The next minute 
he was looking wildly about him, half afraid that 
some one might have noticed his Aveakness, and 
the minute after Avard he Avas rubbing aAvay at his 
forehead, as if to rouse himself out of the trance 
that AA'as on him. 

The Avarders Avere too busy in restoring order, 
and the prisoners in too much commotion to give 
heed to the old gentleman. No one noticed him 
indeed, not CA^en his little godson ; for he, poor 
lad, had turned his face to the door, so that none 
* Sec Mr. Antrobus' book, "The Prison and the School." 



401 



might see and know what he felt. Boy as he 
was, he Avas well aware how those young thieves 
would only sneer at him for his girlish compas- 
sion ; accordingly, he clenched his little fists, and 
dug his nails into his flesh, so that his eyes might 
not seem red when he turned round again. 

" A'thing more, sir ?" asked the chief, when the 
boys had been got back to their seats, and the 
place was quiet again. " A'thing more, sir ?" he 
repeated, in a louder and sharj^er tone, as he saw 
the old gentleman stand still, looking on the 
ground. 

*'^No! no! no! no!" was the half-bewildered 
answer. " I'm going — poor fatherless things — 
home now directly." 

" Like to see our women's prison, sir ?" went 
on the warder. 

Uncle Ben gave a shudder that seemed to go 
all through his body as he replied " Xo ! no ! I've 
had quite enough for one day, thank you." 

" Wooden take yer quarter-an-hour, sir, t'run 
through it," went on the officer, who was as anx- 
ious as a showman that the visitors should see 
all the sights of the place. " See the little things 
in the nuss'ry, then ?" 

Uncle Ben just caught the last words of the 
sentence, and he was all alive again at the bare 
mention of such a place in a jail. " What !" he 
cried, in utter astonishment, " did you say you 
had a nursery here, officer ?" and he stared at the 
man as narrowly as if he was watching the work- 
ings of his countenance, though the gesture was 
merely the instinctive emotion of incredulity on 
Uncle Ben's part. 

The warder bore the scrutiny without as much 
as a wink, and replied, " Yes ; nuss'ry was my 
words, sir. Like to see 't, sir ?" 

The old man, now that he was assured of the 
Cc 



402 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

fact, gave vent to no emotion whatever, but mere- 
ly said quickly, " Of course I should ;" and then, 
jerking down his long waistcoat, he set oif at a 
quick pace out into the yard, saying, "Come 
along, Ben ! come, boy ! we're going to see the 
prison nursery !" and, as he hurried along, even 
an inexperienced eye might have told by the 
short, quick steps he took, and the rapid, twitchy 
jerkings of the arms as he went, that his whole 
frame was in a state of high irritability. 

Again the heavy gates had to be unlocked and 
locked, and more gates forced slowly back, before 
the women's part of the prison was reached. 

There the visitor and his young friend were 
handed over to the care of a matron, with a re- 
quest that they might be shown the nursery por- 
tion of the bolted and barred establishment. 



CHAPTER XXL 

FELONS IN THE CRADLt:. 

Once on the female side of the jail, Ben and 
his uncle soon began to feel that they were out 
of the close and stifling atmosphere of mere drill 
and military discipline (of drill and military dis- 
cipline, save the mark! among a brood of chil- 
dren, who cried aloud for good fathership rather 
than drill-sergeantship to train and tend them) ; 
for the matrons really spoke, and seemed to act 
toward their "erring sisters" as if they had some 
sense of their own frail tendencies, and some little 
feeling for those poor human reeds who had not 
had the power to stand up against the wind.* 

* There may be readers of a sterner mood, unacquainted 
witli prison economy, who may fancy that the transition from 
the mere disciplinarian male jailer to the more humane fe- 
male one borders somewhat on the sentimental or Kosa Ma- 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 408 

The matron to whose charge or care Uncle Ben 
and his little nephew were handed over was a 

tilda school of literature. It may be so ; but the transition 
is not given as a stroke of art, but as a touch of nature. In 
making the prison-tour of the metropolis, and passing day- 
after day with the governors of the several penal establish- 
ments, as the author did but lately, with the view of making 
himself acquainted with the "prison-world," no change was 
so marked, and, indeed, none so refreshing, as the transition 
from the formalities of the male warders to the amenities of 
the female ones. The women's prison at Brixton, as well as 
that at Wandsworth, and, let me add in all justice, that at 
Tothill Fields too (though the punishments at the latter place 
are inordinately excessive, being upward of fifty per cent, more 
than the average proportion of punishments throughout the 
female prisons of all England and Wales), these were cer- 
tainly not the heartless and senseless places that the men's 
and boy's prisons seemed to be (always excepting the stupid 
tyranny of the silent hour (!) at the Brixton Institution) ; and 
they were not so simply because there was some show of kind- 
ly consideration and feeling on the part of the lady-officers 
in charge of the prisoners. Indeed, to this day the author 
has no happier memory than that of going the rounds with 
the compassionate little post- woman at the Brixton prison, 
and seeing what happiness she found in delivering her little 
packets of happiness to the wretched female convicts there, 
or than that of hearing the long prison corridors at the 
Wandsworth House of Correction (which is really a "model 
prison" as to its general management) echo" with the kisses 
of the matrons as they caressed and hugged one of the pretty 
little prison babies, that was being bandied from one female 
warder to the other. The reader may account for this as he 
pleases, but the author believes the simple explanation is to 
be found in the very constitution of womankind itself Male 
power always runs into routine, idle forms, and silly cere- 
monies; but women have so little of the powerful, and so 
little of the drill-master about their nature, while they have, 
on the other hand, so much of the opposite qualities of ten- 
derness and gentleness, that feeling and common sense with 
them are sure not to be utterly overlaid and crushed by mere 
right-about-face tomfoolery. All that is wanted at our male 
prisons is a little less drill and a little more heart — a mild 
medium between your Martinet old-soldierism on the one 
hand, and your Maconochie maudlinry on the other. What 
the female jailers may have been in the olden time the au- 



404 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

lady of very bulky proportions ; so bulky, indeed, 
that the chain which she wore as a girdle round 
her waist, and to which the heavy bunch of prison- 
keys was attached, sank into a deep crease of fat, 
and it was only by the glitter of an obtruding 
corner of a link here and there that one could 
tell she wore any such iron girdle around her 
waist. Her face was as round and pleasant-look- 
ing in its lining, its dimpling and puffy cheeks, 
as a hot-cross bun ; and whether the typical traits 
lay in the amplitude of bust, or the roly-poly char- 
acter of the pudding-bags of flesh about the neck, 
or the obvious staylessness and wabbliness of her 
whole figure, it was difficult to tell ; but there 
was an unmistakable look of the " mother of a 
large family" stamped upon her whole appear- 
ance. Indeed, it was by the name 'mother' — 
mother, in its bare simplicity, without any cog- 
nominal affix — that she was spoken of throughout 
the entire prison. 

The gate-keeper asked how much beer he was 
to take for " mother" to-day — the chief warder, 
when he met the lady, held out his finger and 
thumb, and threw up his nose as he exclaimed, 
"Pinch asntiff*, mother!" The visiting justices 
shook their powdered wigs and smiled beneficent- 

thor has not been able to discover. Whethei* they were as 
brutal and as base as the males (who should have changed 
places with the prisoners themselves, for most of them had 
been thieves in their younger days), it is impossible to say ; 
but the writer of this book has sufficient faith in womanly 
tenderness to believe not. There may have been, and doubt- 
less was, many a gnarled old harridan among the female 
turnkeys of the "good old times;" but as human nature be- 
longs to no one age, depend upon it that, even a century and 
a half back, the majority of the women jailers had the same 
women's hearts as now to temper the rigor of prison rule — 
the same women's weakness and women's pity for misery and 
helplessness — ay, and let me add, the same women's prison 
babies too. 



FELONS IN 'THE CEADLE. 405 

ly as they passed her in the passages leading to 
the governor's room, saying the while, "Well, 
mother, how do we find ourselves to-day, mother 
— eh ?" The impudent boy-thieves would shout 
out after her in the streets when they got their 
discharge, and saw her toddling along to or from 
the prison morning and evening, "I say, moth- 
airr ! come an' give us a kiss, old gal ;" while the 
woman who had just left the prison nursery, and 
stood, with her infant on her arms, at the entrance 
to some court in the town, would drop the good 
prison mother a silent courtesy as she went by and 
chucked the liberated little babe under the chin. 

" Well, sir," said this most matronly matron as 
she led Uncle Ben and the boy along the narrow 
and dark passages of the prison, and proceeded 
to answer the question the elder Benjamin had 
just put to her, " if you askes my opinion as a 
mother, sir," she began, throwing all her wonted 
force upon ' mother,' " as I've been this sixteen 
year come next grotter day, as is the fourth of 
August, as my own Jimmy was borned upon, and 
he's as good and upright and downstraight a boy 
as ever could please a poor dear mother's heart, 
though it is his own poor dear mother as says so 
— if you askes my opinion in that compacity, sir, 
why I reely must say as I can't see as the women 
in our mothers' ward here is at all difterent, in no- 
wise, in their motherly feelings for their poor dear 
little ones, from them as is outside." 

The lady j^aused for a minute, and then added : 
^'That there is what I says to every body, sir — 
they're mothers, sir ;" and here the lady stopped 
again, with the double view of enforcing her fa- 
vorite point upon the gentleman's attention, as 
well as fetching a little breath after the heavy 
flight of stairs she had just mounted — "they're 
mothers, sir," she repeated, " which speaks wol- 



406 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

lums for 'em, sir, I says ; for a mother icill be a 
mother, you laiow, sh*, all the world over ; least- 
wise if she ain't a monster in human .form, as is 
what we don't allow in here, in nowise, sir. I'm 
a mother myself, sir," said she, proudly, pausing 
again and turning full round to stare at Uncle 
Ben as she said the Avords; "the mother of nine 
as fine strapping children as ever you see, sir, as 
is all straight and well made, sir, with never so 
much as a club-foot, nor a hare-lip, no, nor not 
even so much as a j^ort- wine-stain neither among 
one on 'em to blemish their dear bodies, which is 
saying a great deal — ain't it, now, sir? So in 
coorse I knows what a mother's feelings is — which 
is only common humane natur', sir, as I tells my 
good man — he's one of the city watchmen as walks 
the docks ; maybe he ain't onbeknown to you, 
sir," she threw in joarenthetically as she turned 
suddenly roimd once more, "and hasn't never 
slept in his bed by nights, like a Christian man, 
for this twenty year and more, I give you my 
word, sir. I tells him he don't know what a moth- 
er's feelings is, as in coorse he do not ; and them 
as does know what a mother's feelings is, and it's 
only common humane natur', I says again, why, 
they can't but let alone having some bowels of 
passion for them as is mothers in their turn, sir — 
let their sity wation be what it may, poor things. 
So long as they're mothers is all as I cares about." 
By this time the trio had reached the part of 
the building which was set aside as the prison 
nursery. Uncle Ben was little inclined to be talk- 
ative himself, for what he had already seen, and 
what he felt he was about to see, had taken near- 
ly all the words out of him, and made him moody 
with the grave reflections engendered within him. 
There was, however, little demand for siDcech from 
any other while " mother" was present, for even 



FELONS IN THE CEADDE. 407 

the most pertinacious would have found it diffi- 
cult to have insinuated so much as a parenthesis 
into the monologue on her part. 

As the matron dragged back the heavy prison 
door of the "mother's ward," it disclosed a clean- 
ly-looking whitewashed room, about the size of an 
ordinary barn, with barn-like rafters appearing 
overhead. A strong smell of babies and babies' 
food pervaded the place, and the entire shed re- 
sounded with the kissing and prattling of the fel- 
on mothers, and the gurgling and cooing, the cry- 
ing and laughing of the imprisoned babes. On 
the hobs of the ample fireplace at the end of the 
ward were rows of saucepans and pannikins, to 
keep up a constant supply of warm pap, and the 
rails of the high guard-like fender were hung with 
an array of LiUputian linen -r- the convict hahy- 
clotJies^ such as shirts hardly bigger than sheets 
of note-paper, socks but little larger than thumb- 
stalls, and colored blue and white frocks of about 
the same size as the squares of chintz in a patch- 
work counterpane. The room seemed positively 
crowded with cradles too, for they were ranged 
at the foot of the iron bedsteads in Hues, like so 
many tiny boats drawn up on a beach. 

" Them there's our own mothers, sir !" said the 
matron, in an exulting tone, as she stood within 
the doorway previous to entering, and pointing 
to the assembly of babes as if she was proud of 
the exhibition. "There's twenty-three mothers 
altogether in now, with five-and-twenty children 
— two twinses," she whispered in the old man's 
ear. " Poor things ! I never looks at 'em, and 
thinks about 'em, I don't, but what I feels as if I 
were a-going to be took with a 'tack of the spagms. 
You see," she continued, talking in an under tone 
to Uncle Ben, "they're a far betterer class of 
prisoners, the mothers is, than them brazen-faced 



403 YOUNG BENJAMIN PEANKLIN. 

minxes on the t'other side of the women's side, as 
is enough to crud all a mother's milk of humane 
kindness, sir, that they is, I give you my word. 
Augh !" she burst out, with all a true matron's 
indignation, " I'd have such humane warmin as 
them there gals of ourn whipped at the cart's tail, 
I would ; I can't abide sitch unwomanly things ; 
and yet, do you know, I often drops a tear into 
my beer, sir, when I sits and thinks of the little 
bits of gals we has among 'era, and turns my eyes 
innards to their latter end. 

" But these here poor dears, sir," the corpulent 
lady resumed, with a sigh that made the body of 
her dress heave up and down like a carpet in a 
draughty room, " is mothers, sir, as I said afore ; 
and that there shows as there ain't no cuss upon 
them, and they ain't the shameless and 'fection- 
less hussies the other gals is, as I can't abide. 
Ah ! sir, a mother's heart is a great thing, sir — a 
fine thing, sir," the old body went on, as she grew 
half solemn in her tone ; " it makes a woman of a 
woman, it c?o, sir, let alone however bad she may 
ha' been afore ; for d'reckly she has a bit of her 
own flesh and blood in her arms to cuddle and 
take care on, and d'reckly she feels the little thing 
a-drawing its life from out of her own buzzum, 
and a-looking up and a-smiling in her face the 
whiles, I tell you she can't but wish (for I've 
know'd it, and gone through it all myself) as she 
mayn't never do nothink in the world as will hin- 
der her dear child from always a-looking uj) to 
her as it do then." 

Then drawing Uncle Ben half aside, she j^ro- 
ceeded with no little earnestness in her manner 
to say, " And do you mean to tell me, sir, as them 
there poor things, when they has these here moth- 
ers' thoughts come over 'em — as is only common 
humane natur', I say agin — when they sees the 



FELONS IN THE CEADLE. 409 

little hinnocent kritter of their own a-kickiog 
and a-cooing in their lap, and wishes in their 
'arts as they could make it a hemperor or a par- 
son, as every mother do, as is a reel mother to her 
babe, sir — do you mean to tell me, I askes you, 
as these here poor things, as is made of the same 
flesh and blood as ourselves is, sir, don't hate their- 
selves and cuss theirselves for the shame and 
hard lines they've put upon their little one's life 
in a-bringing it into the world with a hand- 
cuff", as a body may say, about its little hinnocent 
wrist ? Well, I can tell you they does^ sir — not 
as they says as much to me, but I sees 'em, when 
they leastwise thinks it, with the tears a-rolhng 
down their cheeks like a boy's marbles does some- 
times onbeknown to hisself down the hile at 
church-time — and that, too, as they sits a-dabbing 
their hands, quite unconscionably, over the little 
dear's mouth, so as to make it babble again like 
the bleating of a little lamb, you know, or maybe 
a-tickling it with their apron-strings in the folds 
of its dear little fat neck as it lays a-sprawling on 
the bed. You'd think they was a-playing with 
the little darling, I dessay, and a-taking part in 
the play too, as a mother loves to do ; for I know 
it, sir — Zknow there ain't nothink in all the wide 
world so beautiful as a baby's laugh to a mother's 
'art. But these here poor things can't hardly 
a-bear to hear their little hinnocents laugh ; for it 
only 'minds them, you see, that the babe hasn't no 
sense of the place it's in, and it's like daggers in 
their 'arts consequently ; 'cos they fears that when 
it grows up to know the start it got in life, it'll 
come to cuss 'em, as they cusses theirselves, for 
the millstone they've been and hung about their 
poor little poppet's neck. This here is only com- 
mon humane natur', I says agin and agin. Why, 
there ain't no parson living as could put the 



410 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

thouglits into these poor mothers' buzzums as 
them there little babes as can't talk can do. 
They're little hangels, I says, sent from heaven to 
tm-n their 'arts, sir. I knows it, I do. I've got 
a mother's 'art myself, sir, and I feels it often 
a-bleeding for 'em." 

Uncle Ben was so little prepared for this sim- 
ple burst of earnest kindness, after the stolid cal- 
lousness of the male officers, that he stared for a 
minute in mute wonder at the good old dame, 
and then said, as he saw his little nephew looking 
up and smiling in her fat, good-natured face, 
" Kiss her — go and kiss her, Ben, for her mother- 
ly love of these poor creatures ;" and then, as the 
boy flung his arms about her neck, he hugged the 
prison " mother," and the " mother" hugged the 
boy, as if they'd been parent and child, while the 
old uncle turned into the corridor and paced rap- 
idly up and down the flag-stones, flinging his 
arms about as if he was preaching to the winds. 

The paroxysm past, he returned to the dame's 
side, repeating her words, " Little angels sent from 
heaven to turn their mother's hearts." Then he 
paused, and looked her full in the face as he ask- 
ed sharply, " And what w^ill they grow up to be, 
think you, mother ?" 

" Young devils, sir — devils," was the emjDhatic 
and not particularly mealy-mouthed answer of the 
woman. 

" I guessed so," said Uncle Ben ; " I foresaw as 
much;" then he was silent for another minute, and 
ultimately jerked out, " But why should it be so, 
mother — why can't such as you prevent it ?" 

" Lor' love you, sir," " mother" replied, her face 
growing as creasy as an old kid glove with the 
smiles that played all over it, " Avhy, how you 
talk ! The world's agin it — every humane being's 
agin it — common hilmane natur' " (her favorite 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 411 

reference) " is agin it. Do you think, I askes you, 
these here poor little babes can ever have the 
same chance of getting a honnest penny as that 
there boy of yourn, or any decent folk's child, let 
alone gentlefolks? It's one thing to be borned 
with a silver spoon, or even any spoon at all — no 
matter whether it's a hold hiron or a wooding 
one — in the mouth, and quite another pair of 
shoes to come into the world with a handcuff 
ready locked about your wrist; for there ain't 
hardly no gitting it off, I can tell you : it grows 
into the flesh like this here wedding-ring has, you 
see." 

The woman put out her finger to show that the 
little gold hoop had become imbedded deeply into 
the skin. 

" A boy as has come of a felon mother is sure 
to find it out sooner or later," she went on, " and 
often much sooner than need be; for people is 
only too quick to fling the 'stificut of his buth in 
any one's face, when it ain't worth paying a shil- 
ling to get it. And so the boy's the more ready 
to take to felon ways than a honnest j^erson's 
child ; for, fust and foremost, he ain't got no ker- 
ackter to lose, you see, and 'cos he ain't got no 
keracter, why honnest people won't have nothink 
at all to do with him. Then I askes you, sir, as a 
gennelman as has seed some little of the world, 
how can sitch a boy ever find out as honnesty's 
the best poUercy, as the saying goes, if so be as 
he can't never get no chance of gitting so much as 
a crust of bread honnestly for hisself ? 

" But there's another p'int as I should like you 
to see, sir, and that there is this here. Though 
the mother's heart of the woman as bore him may 
be, and is mostly, dreadful cut up to see her poor 
little hinnocent with the prison swaddlmg-clothes 
on his httle new-born limbs, and this makes her 



412 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

swear and swear over agin to the little uncon- 
scionable kritter hisself as she'll lead a new life 
for his sake d'reckly she gets her discharge, and 
though she means it all too at the time, more hon- 
nestly than a honnest woman ever can, yet, sir, 
d'reckly as our gate-keeper opens the door to her, 
and her baby and she's got her libbity agin once 
more, why, back she goes, in coorse, to her old 
kimpanions, with her little one in her arms (for 
where elsewhere has she to go to, poor dear ?), 
and then her good resolves is no better than fruit- 
blossoms in Feberrary ; and arter that her moth- 
er's 'art won't hardly dare to open its lips to her- 
self any more about the child. So the poor little 
thing is sent out to play with the young thieves 
and wagabones in the gutter, and there the boy 
larns gutter moralses and thieves' p'ints of right 
and wrong, in coorse ; and then I leaves you to 
judge what his principles is like to be after a few 
quarters of that there schooling. 'Cording, w^hen 
he's about five or six, maybe, he comes to us, 
either for ' cadging,' as they calls it, or for ' pick- 
ing up' coals for his mother ofl" the barges 'long 
shore, or else for stealing bits of hold metal to get 
slices of pudding for hisself, or j^'r'aps for break- 
ing winders for the 'musement of a whole lot of 
the young scarrymoudges. And then, sir, when 
he's been and made his fust plunge, and got over 
the fust shudder-like of going headlong into this 
here pool, why then, sir, he's ready for I don't 
know how many dips agin ; so 'cording he keeps 
on going out and coming in here, like the folks at 
a show dooring fair time, for he finds there's al- 
ways a table ready laid for him here, and a well- 
haired bed always kept made up for him too, and 
that without nothink at all to pay for it, which 
larns him a lesson, sir, as there ain't no unlarning 
as ever I seed in all my time. So in coorse he 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 413 

keej^s on a-coming backuds and foruds to ns, six 
months out and four months in, until at last he 
gets more and more owdacious and devilmay- 
careyfied, till the 'ulks or the gallus puts a final 
end at length ultimately to his k'reer. 

" Ah ! sir, it sets my mother's 'art a-bleeding," 
concluded the good-natured old dame, " when I 
looks at the hinnocent faces of these little things 
(as is liked to the kingdom of heaven, you know, 
sir, in the Church sarvice), and I knows — far bet- 
terer than here and there one — what fate's wrote 
down in the book agin their names, why then I 
sometimes thinks to myself, surelie it 'ud be bet- 
termost if the whole litter of kittens was drownd- 
ed outright. If they're to be hanged arter a while, 
I says, why, where's the good of keeping on 'em 
just to breed more kittens like theirselves in their 
turn, sir, and have more hangman's work to do in 
the final end, sir, after all? These is hard words, 
sir, for a mother to speak, as has got a mother's 
'art in her buzzum, and a whole coopful of chicks 
of her own at home, bless 'em. But I can't help 
it, sir ; it's my mother's 'art as puts the words 
into my mouth, sir — it is." 

" Come ! come, Ben ! come along, boy ! I've 
seen and heard enough, lad, and so have you," 
cried the uncle, as the dame came to an end ; and 
then, turning round, he was about to thank the 
good old body and hurry oflT; but the matron 
seized him by the arm as she said, " You're never 
a-going in that there way, surelie, without never 
so much as a shake of the hand, or a chuck under 
the chin, or a ' God bless you' to my little ones 
here. I calls this here little lot my second fam- 
erly, sir ; and I can tell you, when some of their 
times is up, I often has a good cry over the part- 
ing from some on 'em, the same as if they was a 
tearing my own flesh and blood from me." 



414 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

As the dame and the two Benjamins walked 
slowly down the long room, between the double 
file of prison cradles, they found some of the little 
felon babes j^ropped up in their beds, amusing 
themselves with the rude playthings that the 
mothers had invented to quiet them. One had a 
rag doll, with a couple of stitches in black thread 
for eyes ; another was thumping one of the prison 
tin j^latters, and crowing at the sound it made; 
and another was rattling some pebbles in one of 
the prison pannikins. 

A few of the mothers were walking hurriedly 
up and down the room with their infants in their 
arms, endeavoring to hush them to sleej) by pat- 
ting their backs, and hissing the while as a groom 
does to a horse he is rubbing down ; and others 
were seated at the edge of the iron bedstead, jog- 
ging the little one on their knees to allay the fret- 
fulness of teething. 

But not one lullaby song was to be heard in 
the place. 

As the visitors passed along, most of the women 
rose and courtesied in turn, and every face they 
saw was marked more or less by that dogged, 
sullen, and ill-used air which is so distinctive of 
the criminal character before it is utterly harden- 
ed and shameless. 

"D'ye mind, sir," whispered the matron, in 
Uncle Benjamin's ear, as they moved on a few 
paces, and then came to a stand-still, "there ain't 
a smile nowhere, 'cepting on that there one's face 
— the woman on my right here — and she's got 
six months on it for bigotry, sir ?" 

" For what ?" inquired the old gentleman, in a 
suppressed voice, that still had a deej? tone of as- 
tonishment about it. 

The dame put her mouth close to Uncle Ben's 
ear, and whispered, " Marrying two husbands, sir 
— bigotry we calls it here !" 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 415 

Even Uncle Benjamin, sad and sick at heart as 
he was, had to blow his nose violently on hearing 
the explanation. 

" Ah ! she's a brazen-faced bit of goods, and I 
can't abide shamelessness, I can't," she ran on, 
with a significant toss of the head. " Yonder, 
you see, is a woman Avith two infants, sitting 
by the bed near the door — don't turn your head 
just yet, jDlease, sir, or she'll fancy we're a-talking 
about her," added the kind old matron, speaking 
in the same under tone as one instinctively adopts 
in a sick person's room. " She ain't one of the 
twinses ; she's minding another prisoner's child. 
Oh yes, they're very good and patient to one 
another's children, and we most seldom has cases 
of hill-treatment to punish in 'em. She's in for 
'tempted 'fanticide, sir," continued the loquacious 
guide, as she turned her head away from the young 
woman that Uncle Ben was now regarding with 
an air of pretended vacancy and indifference; 
" and yet there ain't a better mother in the whole 
ward, nor a kinder-hearted kritter breathing nee- 
ther. 

" That there prisoner, two off from the one with 
the couple of babbies," the matron babbled on, 
looking straight away to the opposite side of the 
ward from that which she was directing Uncle 
Ben's attention to — "don't you see, sir? — the 
woman with the sailer complexion, and that there 
dreadful cast in her eye, so that you can only catch 
sight of half the happle on it, sir — she's a very bad, 
dang'rous kerackter, she is : we had to take her 
child from her. Do you know, she treated the 
poor little dear so inhumanely, we really thought 
as how she'd a' been the death on it. But she's 
a rare 'zeption, she is ; and, to tell you my mind, 
I don't b'lieve she's all there, sir," the old gossip 
added, pointing to her forehead, which she affect- 



416 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

ed to scratch the minute afterward. " Her hus- 
band was a ground-lab'rer, sh', and went out for 
an olhdy about six months back, and she never 
sot eyes on him since. She's here for 'legal pawn- 
ing, sir, and got two year on it." 

At this point a clean, flaxen-haired little thing, 
with eyes so intensely blue that the very whites 
had a faint tint of azure in 'em, came toddling 
toward the matron with its plump short arms 
stretched out, and shrieking "Mamma! mamma!" 

The matron, or "mother" as she was called, 
stooped down and caught the little human ball in 
her arms, crying, " What, Annie, my little ducks 
o' dimons !" and then raising it up, she fell to kiss- 
ing it, and rubbing her mouth in its soft neck, 
making the same spluttering noise the while as 
though she was washing her own face with a 
handful of soap and water in her palms. " Bless 
it ! bless its own little heart ! she's mother's own 
poppet, she is — a little booty as ever was horned, 
and as clean and sweet as a new pink, that she is, 
every bit of her, sir. This is my Annie, sir, as I 
calls her ; my dear little darling Annie," she ran 
on, as she tossed the child up and down, crying 
" ketchy, ketchy," right in front of Uncle Benja- 
mm's face — "sAe'5 a sad romp, I can tell you. 
She's two year and three months come the — " 

"21st of May, please," interposed the tidy pris- 
on mother timidly, with a courtesy, for the woman 
had followed her child to the spot. 

"And was horned in this here prison, sir. The 
mother's got six year on it," the old matron add- 
ed aside, as she kept dancing the little one in the 
air till it fairly laughed again, " for shoplifting, 
sir ;" and then, putting her lips close to Uncle 
Ben's ear again, she whispered, " Xot married." 

The " mother" now passed up the ward, car- 
rying and cuddling Uttle Annie in her arms ; and 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 417 

as she journeyed from bed to bed, she put her 
finger in the dimples of the prison babes, and 
made all kinds of tender inquiries, first about the 
teeth of this one, and then the legs of that, as well 
as reminding the women whose terms were about 
to expire that their time would be up next so-and- 
so, and she hoped as how they'd take care and 
never bring that sweet little hinnocent of theirn 
into such a place again. 

Presently, stopping suddenly short at one of 
the beds, she said, '"''Tliat there is the most tim- 
bersome child I ever met with ;" she alluded to a 
poor little white-faced thing who had thick irons 
down its legs, and who was evidently suftering 
from " soft bones." The prison mother was about 
to lead it toward Uncle Ben ; but, though the old 
man held out his hand toward it, the little creature 
hung its head, and struggled and screamed to get 
back to the prison cat that lay curled up on the 
bed it had just left. 

"The mother is married to a private in the 
Granadiers, sir," went on the matron, " and she 
ain't never heerd from him wunst since she was 
took for making away with the work of her 
'ployer, sir. She's got four year on it, and fifteen 
month more to do, sir. You see the child is nat'- 
ral timbersome, sir; besides, poor thing ! it never 
sees no man's face here but the guv'nor's and the 
surjin's, so no wonder it's afeard at the sight 
of strangers' looks. 

" Well, sir," she rattled on, in answer to a ques- 
tion from Uncle Ben, as they turned away, and, 
passing out of the ward, proceeded to descend 
the steps that led to the " mothers' airing-yard," 
" we don't keep no hinfant babe here to over four 
year, sir, though there ii^iere one little thing as we 
wunst had in the prison so long, that when its 
mother's libbity came, it used to call every horse 
Dd 



418 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

it seed in the streets a great big pussy. It did, 
I give you my word, sir." 

Uncle Ben shuddered as a sense of the brute 
ignorance of the Uttle baby-prisoner came over 
him, and the boy at his side stared up with won- 
der and terror in the old " mother's" face, for he 
remembered the tales he had read of the " wild 
boys" found in the w^oods, and how they had 
grown up as senseless as baboons. 

" I won't ask you, sir," said the matron, while 
passing across the yard back to the passages lead- 
mg to the entrance to the women's prison, "now 
that you've that there sweet boy of yourn wdth 
you, who's as like w^hat my own dear Jemmy 
were a year or two agone as ever he can stare — 
only he ain't got my Jemmy's nose 'zackly — to 
come and see our women's ward over on the 
t'other side, for, to speak the candid straightforud 
truth, sir, it ain't 'zackly the place a mother, with 
a mother's 'art in her buzzum, would like to take 
a boy of tender year like hizen to. Ah ! they're 
shocking brazen-faced, ondecent, foul-mouthed ter- 
mygints, that they is, sir, and the little-est on 'em 
is as bad as the biggest-est. They'd only be grin- 
ning in the young gen'elman's hinnocent face, sir, 
and a-making all kinds of grimages at you, sir, 
behind your hinnocent back, as you went along ; 
and as I'm a mother myself — the mother of nine 
living, sir, and have had as many as a baker's 
dozen on 'em, bless 'em! in my time — why, in 
coorse, I knows what a mother's dooty is, thank 
God, and so I won't demean myself to press you 
to stay and see the Jessybells, sir." 

By this time they had reached the heavy and 
big-locked door by which they had entered, and 
as "mother" put the monstei' key into the key- 
hole, she paused for a minute before turning it as 
she said, stooping down to young Ben, " Kiss me. 



FELONS IN THE CEADLE. 419 

my sweet child. I know lie's a dear good boy to 
his poor dear mother as bore him, by the very 
looks on him. Yom* name's Benjamin, ain't it? 
for I heerd your dear father here call you by that. 
Well, I've got a Benjamin of my own, I have, but 
he's four year younger than you, if he's a day ; 
and I'm sorry to say it, my dear, but he's the 
werry worrit of my life, he is, for he bustis his 
clothes out, till, Lor' love you ! it's one person's 
time to look after him, and keep him any thing 
like tidy and 'spectable." 

All the time she was delivering this little do- 
mestic episode she was smoothing young Benja- 
min's hair, or stroking his cheek, or hugging him 
close up to her side. *' There, kiss me agin, dear 
child, for the last final time," she said, " and al- 
ways mind and be a good boy to your poor dear 
mother, whatever you do; for you don't know 
what it is to have a mother's 'art, I can tell you." 

The catch of the enormous prison lock then re- 
sounded with a loud capstan-pall-like click through 
the corridors, and the mother was dropping a 
courtesy to the old gentleman, and giving her 
last broad grin to the young one, as the couple 
went nodding to her through the doorway, when 
she suddenly espied the gate-keeper running, with 
a pewter ^^ot in his hand, so as to get to the " wom- 
en's-side entrance" before the door closed again. 
" Oh, there you are with my beer, at last, young 
man ! Come along, Bennett, for goodness gracious 
sake do^ there's a good soul ! for, heaven knows, 
I'm come over quite swoundy-like for the want 
on it." 

In a few minutes Uncle Ben and his nephew 
were retracing their steps across the boys' " side" 
of the prison, and as the couple strode along sor- 
rowfully, the godfather said, " Ah ! my boy, we 



420 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

have only to imagine tliat years are flying past 
us now instead of minutes to recognize the httle 
baby faces we have just left in the prison nursery 
in that file of boy-thieves that are exercising yon- 
der in the airing-yard before us, and circling away 
one after another like the horses m the equestrian 
booth at a fair." 

As the endless troop of little felons kept shuf- 
fling on (the heavy prison boots clattering on the 
flag-stones with a very difierent noise from what 
their bare feet were wont to make on the pave- 
ment outside the prison gates), the uncle told lit- 
tle Ben to notice the figures on the red cloth that 
was fastened round the left arm of the boys, say- 
ing he would see by them the number of times 
they had been in prison before. " Call the num- 
bers out, Ben, as the lads go by, and let's hear 
the tale they tell of boys many of whom are not 
yet in their teens, and none out of them." 

Little Benjamin did as he was bidden, and the 
story ran as follows : 

10 (recommittals), 2, 4, 7, V, 3, 6, 2, 14, 7, 12, 
10, 2, 4.* 

" That's enough, my boy — that will do, in heav- 
en's name," exclaimed the uncle ; " and hardly 
half a score years back these children were many 
of them in the prison nursery." 

At this point the discipline-loving chief warder 
approached the couple, saying, " Like to see pris'n 
bur'al-groun', sir ?" Uncle Ben shook his head. 
"Very cur'ous — not a tomb-stun 'lowed in it — 
only a 'nitial letter to some — others without noth- 
ink at all to mark whose grave it is — place chuck 
full of bones, sir." 

" No, no," cried Uncle Ben, half petulantly, as 

* These figures are no fiction, but were taken down un- 
der similar circumstances. — See "Great World of London," 
Part VIII., p. 414. 



FELONS IN THE CRADLE. 421 

if he thought this wretched finish to the story 
might have been spared him. " I want to go." 

" Pris'nus own clothes store, very cm-'ous too, 
sir," persisted the showman- warder. " Their own 
clothes is an oncommon strange sight — every one 
says so. All things been foomigutted, so there's 
no fear, I 'sure ye, sir." 

"No, no, man, I want to go, I say," was the 
answer ; whereupon the warder proceeded to un- 
lock door after door as before, and to conduct 
Uncle Ben and his nephew back to the gate. 

"Who are these boys?" asked the old uncle; 
" a fresh batch of prisoners just come in, I sup- 
pose !" 

" No, sir," was the sharp response, " they's the 
'scharges." 

Uncle Ben as well as the warder alluded to a 
group of some half dozen lads who had cast the 
prison garb, and now stood gathered about the 
little clerk's office beside the gate-room, habited 
in their own rags and tatters, ready to regain 
their liberty. Half an hour before they had been 
warmly and comfortably clad, but now many of 
them stood shivering in their scant and rent ap- 
parel. 

One was without a jacket, while another had 
his coat pinned up so as to hide the want of a 
waistcoat, and perhaps a shirt. 

Uncle Ben waited to see the story to its end. 

" William Collins" was called out from within 
the clerk's office, and the warder outside the of- 
fice door, echoing the name, told the boy who an- 
swered to it to step up to the office window. 

Here he was placed in a small jDassage, imme- 
diately in front of the casement, within which 
stood one of the prison clerks, against a desk in 
the office on the other side. 

" You ever been here before ?" asked the clerk, 
in a tone of authority. 



422 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

" No," was the simple answer. 

" B'longs to the Docks," mteri3osed the attend- 
ant warder ; " and a friend's come for him." 

" Ho ! let 'm stejD here, then," rejoined the 
clerk ; and the " friend," who was a boy hardly 
older than the young thief himself, no sooner ap- 
peared outside the window than the voice with- 
in went on, " Who a' you ?" 

" Collins's brother, sir," the boy responded. 

"Well," the voice continued, "his majesty's 
justices of the peace 'uv oddered this boy a shil- 
ling, and they 'opes they'll never see 'm here 
again. So do you ta' care of him." And with 
this admonition and the money the couple passed 
on, to wait till the rest were ready to depart. 

" We alwa's sen's letter to paren's or fren's of 
pris'nus, sirs, prevus to 'scharging on 'em," ex- 
plained the chief warder, who stood aside with 
the two Benjamin Franklins while they watched 
the proceedings. " We does this so that the b'ys' 
fren's may be at gate at the time of thur going 
out, so's to take charge on 'em." 

" James Billington" was next shouted out. 

The minute afterward a mere urchin made his 
appearance outside the office window, his head 
scarcely reaching above the sill. 

" You've been in for robbing yer mother, eh ?" 
began the clerk, who had perceived that there 
were strangers present, and therefore commenced 
laying on the morality in full force. " What a 
horrible fellow of a son you must be to go and do 
that ! W^hy 7nust you go plundering her, poor 
woman, of all persons in the world ? The next 
boy to you has been flogged, and that'll be your 
case if ever you come here again, I can tell you" 
— and, having delivered himself of this lecture, 
he put his head out of the window and inquired, 
" Any body for James BiUington ?" 




•* How came you to break sixty panes of glas5, eh?" 



FELONS IN THE CKADLE. 426 

" Nobody for Billington," answered the gate- 
keeper. 

"Where does your mother live?" demanded 
the clerk. 

" In a cellar in Hold Street, please, sir," was 
the reply of the boy, with a smile on his lip, and 
utterly unaffected, of course, by what had been 
said to him. 

" B'y's been here offen afore," the chief warder 
said aside to Uncle Ben. " He's bad boy 'deed, 
sir !" 

" Henry Norris" was the next lad called for. 

" How long ha' you been here, Norris ?" the 
clerk began with this one. 

" Six weeks," the boy said, doggedly. 

" How offen afore ?" the other went on. 

"Three times here, and twice in jail up in the 
country," was the cool and frank rejoinder. 

" Ha ! we're getting it out of you a little," add- 
ed the clerk. " Nobody for Norris, I s'pose?" he 
said, again thrusting his head out of the window. 

" No, sir," exclaimed the gate-keeper. 

" Thomas Wilson" was then called. 

'* What time ha' you been here, Wilson ?" in- 
terrogated the clerk, as a fresh boy came up to 
the window, but who was so short that the man 
in the office had to thrust his head out in order 
to see him. 

" Ten days, please, sir," answered the brat, in 
a whining tone. 

"And how offen afore?" demanded the other. 

" Six time, please, sir," the boy went on, whin- 
ing. 

" Now that's very pretty for a child of your 
age, ain't it ?" continued the moral man in office. 
" How came you to break sixty panes of glass? — 
for that's what you were charged with, you know 
—eh?" 



■i2G YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

• " I did it all along with other boys, please, sir 
— 'eaving stones," the child again whined out. 

" A set of mischeevous young ragamuffins," the 
moralist persisted. " Was the house empty, eh?" 

"No, please, sir, it wer'n't no house, sir; it 
were a liold factory, please, sir, and there was 
about a hundred panes broke afore we begunned ; 
so us boys was a trying to smash the rest on 'em, 
sir, when I got took." Such was the childish ex- 
planation of the felonious offense. 

"Any body for boy of the name of Thomas 
Wilson ?" shouted out the clerk. 

" No, sir, nobody for Wilson," the gate-keeper 
made answer once more. 

"Well, then," continued the clerk, "that's all 
the 'scharges for to-day, so you can let 'em all go, 
Bennett." 

" Come along, Ben," said the imcle, hurriedly, 
as he heard the last words; "I want to see the 
end of all this. Good-day, warder, good-day;" 
and the moment afterward the officer in charge 
of the gate opened the outer door, and the w^retch- 
ed young thieves and vagabonds were once more 
at large in the world. 

Uncle Ben j^assed with his nephew through the 
prison portal at the same time, and stood close 
against the gate, watching the proceedings of the 
liberated boys. 

The lad whose "brother" had come to take 
charge of him had two other youths of rather 
questionable appearance waiting to welcome him 
outside the prison gates. 

The other little creatures looked round about 
to see if they could spy any friend of theirs loi- 
tering in the neighborhood. 

None was to be seen. 

Of all the young creatures discharged from the 
hoys'' x>rison that morning^ not a father^ nor a 



UNCLE BEN AT HOME. 427 

mother^ nor even a grown and decent friend was 
there to receive them.^ 

Uncle Ben stood and watched the wretched 
little friendless outcasts turn the corner of the 
roadway, and saw the whole of them go off in a 
gang, in company with the susj^icious - looking 
youths who had come to welcome the boy whose 
"brother" alone had thought him worth the 
fetching. 

Then turning to his little nephew, he cried 
aloud, " If ever you forget this lesson, Ben, you've 
a heart of stone, lad — a heart of stone !" 



CHAPTER XXII. 

UNCLE BEN AT HOME. 



It has been said that it is imj^ossible to stand 
uj) under an archway during an April shower with 
a man of really great mind without being impress- 
ed that we have been conversing with some su- 
perior person. 

But — no matter, let it pass. 

Nevertheless, it is certain that we have but to 
enter the ordinary sitting-room (not the " show- 
room," mark !) of any person, great or small, in 
order to read in every little article of furniture or 
knick-knackery, or even in the odds and ends that 
we find scattered about, some slight illustration 
of the pursuits, the habits, the tastes, the affec- 
tions, ay, and even the asj^irations of the individ- 
ual to whom the chamber belongs. 

Uncle Ben's " own room" was not a " reception- 
room," but a " retiring-room ;" a small chamber 
on " the two-pair front," that served him at once 
for study and dormitory too. 

* The bare fact. 



428 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

On one side of the apartment stood the high 
turu-up bedstead, with its blue and white check- 
ed curtains drawn closely round it, and bulging- 
out from the wall like the hind part of a peep- 
show caravan. The furnitm-e was of the straight- 
backed, rectangular, and knubbly kind usually 
seen in curiosity shops nowadays, but w^hich, in 
Uncle Benjamin's time, was hardly old-fashioned, 
and this consisted simply of a small old oaken ta- 
ble, knobbed over with heads of cherubim round 
the sides, with legs as bulky as a brewer's dray- 
man's, and a kind of wooden " catch-cradle" to 
unite them at the base, as well as two or three 
chairs with backs as long and legs as short as 
weasels. In one corner was set a kind of small 
triangular cupboard, with a square of looking- 
glass in the lid, and a basin let into a circular hole 
beneath ; but, though this was fitted with a small 
door below, the style of workmanship was so dif- 
ferent from the rest of the furniture, that, had it 
not been for the box of tools in another part of 
the room, one might have wondered what country 
carpenter had wrought it. 

Against the wall dangled a few book-shelves 
slung on a cord, and these also were obviously of 
home manufacture. Here the very backs of the 
volumes (without reference to the marginal notes, 
with which many of the pages were scribbled 
round (formed a small catalogue of the tastes, 
principles, and habits of thought peculiar to the 
man who had "picked them up cheap" at auc- 
tions and book-stalls — for many had the lot-mark, 
or second-hand price-label still partly sticking to 
their covers. Here one shelf was devoted to 
Shakspeare's "Plays and Sonnets," Bacon's "No- 
vum Organum" and " Moral Essays ;" Newton's 
" Principia," " Optics," and " Observations on the 
Prophecies of Holy Writ ;" IMilton's " Paradise 



UNCLE BEN AT HOME. 4<J9 

Lost," " Comus," " L' Allegro," and " Penseroso," 
as well as his "Character of the LoDg Parlia- 
ment;" Butler's "Hudibras," Mandeville's-" Fa- 
ble of the Bees, or Private Vices Public Benefits," 
and " The Port Royal Logic ;" Erasmus' " Praise 
of Folly," Owen Feltham's " Resolves," and a 
translation of Seneca on " Old Age ;" " A Brief 
Accomit of the Controversies between the Nom- 
inalists and Realists," John Bunyan's " Pilgrim's 
Progress," and Sir Thomas More's "Utopia, or 
the Happy Republic ;" Longinus " On the Sub- 
lime and Beautiful," Bishoj) Butler's "Sermons 
on Human Nature," Evelyn's " Sylva, or a Dis- 
course on Forest-trees," as well as Sir Thomas 
Brown's " Religio-Medici" and " Vulgar Errors." 

On the shelf beneath this again were packed the 
"Life of Martin Luther," and his "Table-talk," 
the "Trial and Martyrdom of John Huss," and 
the works of Wicliff, with Baxter's " Plea for the 
Quakers ;" the Sermons of Bishop Fuller and Jer- 
emy Taylor, together with the " Holy Living and 
Dying" of the latter, besides Peter Folger's quaint 
poem entitled " A Looking-glass for the Times," 
Defoe's " Shortest Way with the Dissenters," and 
Dr. Mather's " Essay to do Good," not forgetting 
" The Whole Duty of Man." 

Then the lower shelf of all was filled with Plu- 
tarch's "Lives" and Fuller's "Worthies," "The 
History of the Crusades," Josephus' " History 
of the Jews," "The History of England," and 
also that of " The Christian Church," besides Ra- 
leigh's " Travels Round the World," and " Some 
Account of the present State of Jerusalem." 

Moreover, there were a few stray volumes 
equally characteristic of the occupier of the apart- 
ment, such as Nicholas Culpepper's "Herbal," 
and a " Treatise on Apparitions and Ghosts," to- 
gether with a small " Manual of Short-hand," a 



430 YOtTNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" History of Witchcraft," a copy of the " Test and 
Corporation Acts," a pocket " Latin Dictionary," 
and a well-thumbed " Concordance ;" while ar- 
ranged along the top of the drawers beneath was 
a series of huge volumes labeled " Biblical Com- 
mentaries," and secretly stowed away on one of 
the shelves of the cupboard in the wall, beside the 
fireplace, was a small regiment of octavos in the 
shape of Bayle's " Philosophical Dictionary," and 
the folio edition of Hobbes' " Leviathan," as well 
as his " Analysis of the LIuman Litellect and Af- 
fections." 

Again, the few prints about the room were each 
illustrative of the true character of little Ben's god- 
father, and told the observer that Uncle Benjamin 
w^as something more than a strict Puritan in his 
tastes, for pinned against the wall was Holbein's 
"Dance of Death," as well as a few of Rem- 
brandt's etchings that he had picked up from his 
Dutch friends in the town ; then, besides these, 
there was a grand steel engraving of Thomas 
Franklin, his elder brother, in his barrister's wig 
and gown (this was dedicated to Squire Palmer, 
of Northampton), together with a small water- 
color painting of the old smithy at Ecton, in 
Northamptonshire, as it appeared after the heavy 
snow-storm of 1642, with ^''Benjamin Franklin^ 
Plnxit^'^ scribbled in one corner. Farther, above 
the mantel-piece was pinned one of the pictorial 
conceits that were so popular at the period, con- 
sisting of a full-length portrait of ITncle Ben him- 
self, drawn half " in his habit as he lived," and 
half skeleton, and evidently painted by the same 
hand as sketched the family forge, while on the 
other side of this was a simple curl of flaxen hair, 
framed and glazed, with the signature of a letter 
in a female hand pasted below it, saying merely, 

" Thine till deaths MaryP 



UNCLE BEN AT HOME. 



The only evidence of the religions temperament 
of the man was the following Bible text, written 
out large, in Uncle Ben's own hand, and pasted 
up between the lock of hair and the deadly-lively 
portrait of Uncle Ben himself: 



" When thou prai/est^ thou shalt not he as the 
hypocrites are; for they love to pray standing 
in the sytiagogues^ and hi the corners of the 
streets^ that they may he seen of men. Verily^ 
I say unto you^Tliey have their revaard. 

'•^ But thou^ lohen thou pray est., enter into 
thy closet y and lohen thou hast shut thy door., 
pray to thy Father vnhich is in secret ; and 
thy Father., which seeth in secret., shcdl reward 
thee openly.'''' — Matt., vi., 5, 6. 



The underscoring of the Avords " seen of meyi^'' 
and " when thou hast shut thy door^'' was Uncle 
Ben's own. 

On the table, however, stood the old family 
relic, the "joint-stool," which Uncle Ben had beg- 
ged as an heir-loom of his elder brother Thomas, 
the barrister, before leaving Ecton for New En- 
gland, and by means of which the forefathers of 
the Franklin family used to read their Bible in 
secret (at a time when it was '-'- felony'''' to do so), 
with the book fastened under the lid, so that the 
volume might be hidden the instant the approach 
of the dreaded "apparitor" was announced by the 
boy stationed at the door. The book was still 
kept conscientiously hidden as before ; for, though 
the government apparitor was no longer feared, 
Uncle Ben dreaded the social spy (who will not 
allow us still to worship as we please) catching 
him at his devotions. Indeed, the honest-natured 
old fellow hated in his heart any thing that might 
even seem like the parade of what he knew to be, 



432 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

when deeply felt, a purely secret emotion ; for he 
did not scruple to declare that as love is always 
mute in its profundity, and grief chatters only 
when dumb despair is passing into whining mel- 
ancholy, so true religious reverence is silent and 
solemn as the woods which are ever congenial to it. 

Within this joint-stool also was kept the print- 
ed list, that was regularly sent to Uncle Ben ev- 
ery year, of the subscriptions and donations to the 
principal hospital of the town during the past 
twelvemonth. The eye might have looked up 
and down the grand names and the rich array of 
figures till Doomsday, and never have found there 
even so much as a B. F. 21 5., though in turning 
over the pages it might have detected written at 
the end of the long list, in the same clear hand as 
that which had penned the text over the mantle- 
l^iece, the following quotation : 

'•'' Therefore^ ii^ihen thou doest thine alms, do not 
sound a trumpet before thee, as the hypocrites do 
in the synagogues and in the streets, that they 
may have glory of men. Verily I say unto you. 
They have their reward. 

'•''But ichen thou doest alms, let not thy left 
hand kiioic ichat thy right hand doethP 

These, with tbe addition of the ever-memorable 
two volumes of manuscript sermons that he had 
taken down himself from the most celebrated 
preachers of his time, and a dumj^y ear-trumpet, 
that was not unlike a cow's crumpled horn, and 
Avhich of late years he had used in church, so as 
not to lose a word of the discourse he wanted to 
transcribe — these, we say, with occasionally one 
flower in a tumbler of water, and a Dutch oven 
for the cooking of " Welsh rarebits" — for which 
the old man frankly confessed an overweening 
weakness of the flesh — made up our broker's in- 
ventory of Uncle Ben's worldly goods. 




CXCLE BEN EXPLAINS THE DUTIES OF LIFE, 



UNCLE BEN AT HOME. 435 

The boy and his uncle sat at either end of the 
small oaken table, with the joint-stool between 
them, sipping their morning's jDorringer of bread 
and milk, in front of the little wood fire that 
crackled away on the hearth, for the autumn days 
had suddenly set in chilly. 

" Now, Master Ben," began the godfather, "we 
have looked up our text, and are well primed for 
the discourse, so I hope you've got your sitting- 
breeches on this morning, for I fancy we shall 
want some sticking-plaster, lad, to keep you to 
your chair before I have done with you. Yet 
stay ! when we've got the porringers out of the 
way, you shall have my picture there of the old 
smithy at Ecton to copy; so you can sit and 
draw, while I walk about the room and talk, and 
that'll take the fidgets out of the pair of us." 

It was not long before the breakfast things were 
cleared away, and room made at one corner of the 
table for the sheet of paper, as well as the painting 
that the boy was to work upon while he listened. 

Then the old man, having cut a pencil for the 
youth with a knife that had no end of blades and 
a small set of tools besides in its handle, and 
lent him his box of colors for the occasion, said, 
" There, lad, now go to work ; sketch the outline 
in lightly first, and then just fill in the little bits 
of color here — the red glare of the fire inside the 
forge, you see, and the dark, swarthy figure there 
of old Mat Wilcox ; for that was meant for Mat. 
I wonder where he is now, poor. fellow. I re- 
member well his standing to me for the picture, 
just as you see him there, Ben, with his shirt- 
sleeves rolled up, and his big leathern apron on, 
in the act of hammering away at the glowing bit 
of metal he holds in the pincers. And after that, 
lad, you can put in the black clouds of smoke 
pouring out of the forge chimney, and the gray 



436 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

leaden sky there, as well as the bright green little 
specks of houseleek that the snow has not quite 
covered over on the roof at one part, you see — 
and the robin, too, perched on the thatch where 
the snow's thawed there by the flue, and with the 
trident marks of his feet all along the roof Then 
that done, lad, you can pass on to color in the 
under parts of the boughs here of the old beech- 
tree that grew beside the forge, and the two or 
three little children there peeping in at the door 
— let me see, whose children were they ? Oh, I 
remember. "Ha — ah!" the old man sighed, 
"what would I give to see the old place again, 
and have all the fresh thoughts of one's youth 
rush back into one's brain ! Ha — ah ! but that 
can never be now. There," he broke ofl" sudden- 
ly, as he flung the recollections from him, "you 
needn't take any particular pains over it, boy, for 
it isn't the sort of thing to please my taste now. 
There's too much white and too much bright color 
about it to suit my eye at jDresent. Still, it's a 
nice thing to look upon, Ben, bad as it is — a very 
nice thiug ; for when I did it I was but little more 
than your own age, boy, and I can hardly glance 
at it now without feeling young again. However, 
this'll never do," he broke away suddenly again, 
" for we must go to work, the pair of us." 



.CHAPTER XXIH. 

A PEEP INTO TUE HEART. 

The old man passed his liands behind his skirts, 
and began striding up and down the room as he 
said, " AVell, lad, we understand something about 
the business and the amusements of life, and we 
now want to find out what are its duties." 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 437 

" Oh yes, uncle," cried the boy, " I know now 
what you mean ; what I saw at the poor-house 
and the jail taught me a great deal." 

" Not so fast, boy, not so fast ! We'll see what 
is the lesson they ought to teach you by-and-by," 
rejomed the uncle. "All in good time, my little 
philosopher, all in good time. Now you remem- 
ber I told you, Ben, that to experience a sensual 
pleasure it is essential that the object should be 
immediately present to us ? The sugar, for in- 
stance, is on our tongue, the perfume in our nos- 
trils, the musical note ringing hi the ear, and then 
we feel immediately, without any thought inter- 
vening, that the sensation is more or less agreea- 
ble to us. With an intellectual pleasure, howev- 
er, the enjoyment is never derived directly from 
the sensible impression itself, but rather from the 
peculiar nature of the thoughts, or intellectual 
perceptions engendered within the brain. For 
instance, in the pleasure we derive from wit : the 
sensible impression which causes the perception 
of the odd association may be neither agreeable 
nor disagreeable to us. We may not care about 
the tone in which it is uttered, nor the paper and 
print on which we read it ; but the perception of 
the extravagance in the connection of the ideas is 
no sooner forced upon us by such means than we 
are immediately thrown into convulsions of de- 
light. So, again, with the imagery and sugges- 
tions of poetry, and the contemplation of works 
of high art, as well as the sublimities of nature ; 
the mere sensation has nothing to do with the 
intellectual enjoyment farther than being the 
cause of the peculiar condition of mental exer- 
cise, excitement, or satisfaction we are thrown 
into, and from which alone the enjoyment pro- 
ceeds." 

" Yes, T think I can make out the difference 



433 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

pretty Avell, uncle," interposed the boy, looking up 
from his drawing for a minute. 

" Very well, Ben," w^ent on the teacher ; " and 
I must now point out to you another distinction, 
and that is the main distinction between the in- 
tellectual and the moral pleasures of our nature." 

The boy paused to hear the explanation. 

" In what are called moral pleasures," contin- 
ued the other, " there is always associated a per- 
ception of some good or evil happening to our- 
selves or others, but with intellectual pleasures no 
such perception is connected." 

" Really, uncle, I don't see ^Aa^," argued the lit- 
tle fellow. " Isn't this picture now good to me ? 
and wasn't Avhat you said to me about books the 
other day just as good to me too, in its way, as 
what old ' mother' said about the poor little pris- 
on babies ?" 

" The confusion, my little man," replied Uncle 
Ben, "is merely the confusion of words loosely 
used rather than any want of distinctness in the 
ideas. We call sweetmeats good, and say that 
such a poem is good ; and we sj^eak of a good 
joke, a good idea, and even a good number, or a 
good deal, as well as good fortune and good men. 
But this is only our vague way of talking, and 
there is no necessity to be always ' speaking by 
the card,' as Shakspeare calls it, for this would 
make our conversation savor more of the crabbed- 
ness of scholastic logic than the grace of familiar 
intercourse. We need to be precise only where 
precision is needed, in order to prevent mistakes 
betw^een the delicate shades of ideas and feelings. 
In common parlance, it is enough to say a thing 
is green for us to know roughly what is its pecul- 
iar color ; but wdth artists, who are aware that 
there are infinite varieties of this particular color, 
we require to define, if possible, the precise hue or 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 439 

species of green : is it light green, or ' green ver- 
diter,' or ' terre-verte,' or ' Brunswick green,' or 
is it a ' green gray,' and so on. Well, then, the 
word good^ in its strict signification, is any \M\x\^ 
which benefits or promotes the permanent well- 
being of om-selves or others, and not merely that 
which pleases us for the moment, no matter how 
purely or transcendently. In this sense, friend- 
ship is good, kindness good, the same as food is 
good, and even medicine itself is good, though it 
may be sensually disagreeable to us." 

"Oh, I see what you mean now, "'said the boy ; 
" good, then, I suppose, is what serves to do us 
good, as people say." 

" Right, lad. It is what tends to promote our 
worldly welfare ; therefore you will see readily 
enough, that however much a smart joke or fine 
poem may serve to delight us, it can not logically 
be said to be good, and that simply because it does 
not serve to advance our well-being." 

" Yes, yes, uncle, I understand it now, perfect- 
ly," exclaimed the young artist. 

" That point being settled then," proceeded the 
old man, " of course it follows that a moral pleas- 
ure is the enjoyment we derive from the percep- 
tion of some worldly good or benefit accruing to 
ourselves or others; so now let us proceed to 
find out what this worldly good or benefit really 
means, and then we shall understand why things 
may be agreeable, and good too, as food and fruit 
are ; health, as well as kindly counsel, and charity 
too." 

" Well, uncle," asked the youth, who was anx- 
ious, after Avhat he had seen, to have the riddle 
unriddled as quickly as possible, " and what does 
worldly good or benefit, as you say, really mean ?" 

" I must turn your thoughts back again, Ben, 
before answering that question," was the reply. 



440 YOUNG BENJAMIN PEANKLIN. 

" Now what did I tell you was the great boon of 
sensual pleasure ?" be inquired. 

" Oh, I remember, uncle !" the little fellow cried, 
starting from his seat, " you called them ' after- 
graces ;' you said they were enjoyments that had 
been superadded — that was the word you used 
— to the operations of the senses themselves, and 
that there was no real necessity for the addition 
of them ever having been made. I recollect well 
how you told me that light was quite enough for 
the purpose of seeing, still the beauty of color 
and form had been added to it ; sound sufficient 
for hearing, still melody had been connected with 
it — I'm repeating it all as nearly as possible in 
your words, uncle — and that, though food alone 
Avas necessary to allay appetite and sustain life, 
yet it had been made dehcious to us as well. 
And all these things you said too, uncle, were 
* signal evidences' — I remember the term well — 
of the goodness and kindness of the Creator to 
his creatures." 

Uncle Ben took the little fellow and hugged 
him in his arms, for this was the religion he Avant- 
ed his godson to get fast and deep into his heart, 
and the religion that the old man dearly loved to 
talk about too ; for he knew how it made a tem- 
ple of the whole world — a temple not only of the 
highest beauty, but of the highest and sweetest 
worship, filling the mind to overflowing with the 
line composite emotion of admiration, love, grati- 
tude, sublimity, and reverence. Again and again 
he hugged the boy, for he now knew that he had 
not been talking to the winds as they sat by the 
sea-shore at night, and he told the little fellow 
with his kisses how glad he was to see the fruit- 
buds bursting forth at last in the little sapling 
that he had long loved to tend and rear. 

The boy knew the old man's inarticulate Ian- 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAET. 441 

guage by heart as well and naturally as the young 
bird comprehends the chirrup of its j^arent, and 
every fond embrace of Uncle Ben made his nerves 
quiver as harp-strings that are tuned in unison 
are said to vibrate responsively to each other. 

Presently the uncle was pacing the chamber as 
before, and the boy once more sketching away at 
the table. 

" Well, then, my little man, I now want to show 
you," resumed the teacher, " that as our sensual 
and intellectual pleasures are bountiful, and won- 
drously benevolent additions to the mere perceiv- 
ing and knowing faculties of the senses and the 
intellect itself, so the moral jjleasures, or the sense 
of moral good, is the crowning goodness and kind- 
ness of all. Why should we have been made to 
feel gratified for any thing, Ben ? why ?" 

He paused for a moment or two, and then add- 
ed, " There was no necessity, lad, for such a feel- 
ing ; the exigencies of continued existence did not 
require it — for flies live on for a term ; they go 
after their food, and eat it, and yet no insect ever 
had an affection for the hand that fed it. Try and 
imagine fondness in a gnat, gratitude in a flea, 
love in a maggot, and you will comprehend that 
there was no vital necessity for the addition of 
any such emotions to man. The human maggot 
might have seen and thought, calculated and rea- 
soned, just as acutely as he does now; he might 
have known as much science, have learned as 
many languages, have been as profound in the 
subtleties of logic and metaphysics as he is at 
present, without any heart at all — nay, he might 
perhaps have been even deeper skilled, and more 
subtle and clear-sighted, lacking human emotions 
than possessing them ; for the heart often warps 
the judgment of the brain, as is seen in what is 
termed sentiment, even as the brain often checks 



442 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the promptings of the heart, as we ourselves, Beu, 
saw m the matter of prison discipline." 

"Well, micle, and why should we have been 
made to feel grateful for any thing?" asked young 
Ben ; and he would have added, " grateful as I 
now feel to you ;" but, boy as he was, he blushed 
at the idea of making empty professions. 

"Simply, my son, because God, in his goodness, 
has willed it so," returned the pious old man, sol- 
emnly ; and a quick observer might have noted 
the uplifting of the soul at the same time, in the 
slight elevation of the eye, as he uttered the words. 
" We might have eaten our bread, lad, yes, and 
have relished the dainty snack of the new loaf 
too, and yet not have felt the grateful and half- 
sacred pleasure we do in lookmg at a corn-field. 
We might have slaked our thirst in the crystal 
spring, ay, and have enjoyed all the deliciously 
pure delight of a draught of cool, clear, and fresh 
water, and yet never have positively loved the 
brook-side, nor have regarded certain wells as 
holy places. We might have quailed our moth- 
er's milk, Ben (that wondrous elixir which the 
kindly providence of the great Father has made 
to gush forth, as the one indisputable human birth- 
right, on our very entry into the world — a fluid in 
which the subtlest chemistry can detect no germ 
of bone, muscle, or nerve, hair, nail, or blood, and 
yet which holds all the elements of the human 
body in the most perfect solution) — we might 
have quaffed this, I say, and we might still have 
found our first delight in the sweet fountain of our 
parent's bosom, and yet the babe need not have 
been made to turn up its little eyes and smile its 
gratitude in the face of her who nourishes it as it 
drinks in the liquid life. Neither was there any 
vital necessity why the very first emotions stir- 
ring the heart should have been the purest and 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 443 

holiest of all worldly feelings — those of love and 
gratitude, almost to adoration, for the gentle and 
fond creature that nurses us. 

" We might, lad," the old man continued, after 
a pause, " rather have been sent into the world 
mentally mature, with our brain as fully developed 
as that of a new-born bee, and have been created 
wise and reasoning young imps, had it been so 
willed ; and we might then have asked ourselves, 
as we lay in our cradle, y:hy should we be grate- 
ful for all this maternal care ? lohy should we love 
the mother that feeds and fosters us ? Our jndg- 
ment, too, might, under such conditions, have 
whispered in our ear, it was no merit on her part 
to do so ; she was made to love and cherish, and 
can not choose but obey the impulse within her. 
And all this fine common sense might have frit- 
tered human gratitude down to mere brute folly, 
when looked at under the withering scrutiny of 
cold-blooded criticism. Yet, my little man, log- 
ically foolish as this same gratitude or love may 
appear, it is assuredly morally beautiful, ay, and 
the highest moral beauty too ; and without it we 
should have begun life but as mere parasitical 
vermin, with no sense nor regard for the body 
Avhich jfeeds us. 

" Oh, uncle, uncle," exclaimed the boy, throw- 
ing down his pencil, " I never knew there was so 
much goodness in the world." 

" It is a world full of goodness, Ben, as it is a 
world full of beauty, if we will but open our eyes 
to it," responded the teacher, "for it is God's own 
handiwork, ornate with all the wondrous good- 
ness nnd beauty of the divine nature." 

The old man reflected for a moment, and then 
said, " Well, you see now, Ben, that we have our 
sense of moral good and moral beauty given to 
us over and beyond our reason and our sense of 



4U YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

intellectual delight, even as our capacity of enjoy- 
ing the agreeableness of sensible impressions has 
been superadded to our mere sensations them- 
selves, and we can only bow our head and lift 
up our soul in thankfulness for the profuse benev- 
olence of the gifts." 

The little fellow covered his face with his hands, 
and cried aloud with all a boy's fervor, " Thank 
you — thank you both." 

"Now it is the instinctive gratitude we feel, lad, 
w^hen any good is done to us," the uncle resumed, 
" or, indeed, when any pleasure is given to us, as 
well as the instinctive love which springs uj) with- 
in us for the cause of such pleasure or good, that 
makes the whole world not only a world of beau- 
ty, but a world of love too. It is the continued 
reverting of the mind to past enjoyment, and the 
gratefulness that the mere memory of a pleas- 
urable feeling produces on the soul, that make 
up that sweet and tender affection of our nature 
which we call regard / and it is this continued 
regard, or the new delight we experience in con- 
templating the causes of our past dehghts, which 
makes objects that are beautiful to us become ob- 
jects of love also. Hence we not only like the 
flowers, the birds, and the sunshine, the brooks 
and the fields, the- woods, the country lanes, and 
the sea-shore, but we get to love them also. The 
entire world thus comes to be garlanded over with 
our affections, and every nook and corner of the 
earth hung with some bright lamp of our adora- 
tion, while even the light-threads of the stars 
themselves serve as golden cords to link our heart 
with the very firmament. The sweet aroma of 
the rose, for instance, Ben," he went on, "fills 
the nostrils with a luscious perfumed vapor — an 
ethereal incense of honey-dew, that steeps the 
sense in a balm of redolent delight, while the del- 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 4t5 

icate tinting of the blossom, that is a ]3inky ball 
of beauty, together with the wondrous packing 
of its many petals, and the fine, smooth texture of 
the rose-leaves, that are soft as foam in the hand, 
as well as the charming symmetry and rounded- 
ness of the composite form, with the exquisitely 
varied undulating lines of the details, besides the 
2:)retty serrate edges and elegant oval shape of the 
richly contrasting green leaves below, jutting here 
and there from the reedy flower-stem, besi^urred 
with many a little spine — all these points of pret- 
tiness serve in their turn to charm the j^alate of 
the eye with the damtiest visual luxury, so that 
the sense is doubly gratified. And then, in the 
very gratefulness of our nature, the mind turns 
instinctively to the cause of the delight, and gets 
to love, and look with thankfulness upon the little 
garden beauty for the pleasure it has given us. 
ISTor does the expression of the soul's gratitude 
last only while the charm is on us ; but, on the 
contrary, so enduring is our thankfulness, that 
even the very idea of the rose afterward is sufii- 
cient to revive the sense of all its associate win- 
someness ; and thus we never hear the name of 
the flower, nor think of the graceful, odorous blos- 
som, without having a regard for the object it- 
self — without turning the mind back to the enjoy- 
ment it gave us, and feeling a faint touch of the 
past pleasure thrilling the brain again. As it is 
with the rose, Ben, so is it with every other object 
of natural beauty, till the world itself becomes a 
galaxy of bright associations and glowing endear- 
ments ; and every tiny bit of prettiness we can 
remember in the hedgerows, on the hill-side, by 
the river's brink, in the caves, on the rocks, upon 
the cliffs, and along the shore, seems to shine like 
a little star in the brain, and to twinkle in the dark 
dome of the memory with all the tender glory of 
the holiest love." 



44G YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

Young Ben's heart was too deeply touched for 
words ; so, starting from his seat, he ran toward 
his teacher, and flinging his arms about the old 
man's neck, kissed him again and again, as if he 
was trying to give back a little of the love his 
uncle had bred in him ; and then, as if half abash- 
ed, he hid his head upon the other's shoulder. 
The godfather knew what it all meant, and loved 
the boy the more for the very speechlessness of 
the emotion that was on him. 

" Come, my lad," at last Uncle Ben said, " we 
have too much to do, and too little time to do it 
in, to waste the moments in fondness ; so go back 
to your seat now, and listen." And then he went 
on again as follows : " But not only do we get to 
love every object of beauty in the world about 
us," said he, " as if it were really a friend and 
benefactor to us, and to hate to see it injured or 
destroyed, as well as to desire and long for the 
renewed possession of it, but we get to love also 
the varied and diflerent aspects of nature in the 
same manner. We love, for example, the blush- 
ing beauty of the young virgin morn, as she steps 
from out her bed of night, and parts the crimson 
curtains of her oriel window to peep at the wak- 
ing world once more ; and we love the fiery glory 
of the sunset, too, Avhen the great orb of day seems 
to die with all the peaceful grandeur of a martyr 
amid the lurid flames, or lies like some mighty 
hero welling his blood upon the earth, as he gives 
his last look of glory to the world. We love the 
golden fervor of the noon, and the silver serenity 
of the night. We love the maniac rage of the 
foaming and howling storm, and the fine, thought- 
ful calm of the forest. We love the bustle of the 
work-day world of enterprise, when the city seems 
to roar like the sea with the chafing tide of hu- 
man passion ; and, on the other hand, we love 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 447 

the lull of the Sabbath, when the strife of human 
greed ceases for a while, and the earth is quiet as 
when the flocks are folded for the night. We 
love the pageantry of travel, and the long pro- 
cession of new countries and strange people. 
We also love the cosy rest and welcome looks of 
the old familiar faces at home. We love the 
tenderness and freshness of the new green of the 
earth at spring-time, when the orchards are all 
silvered over with their fleecy clouds of fruit- 
blossoms, and the hedges are white as wedding- 
favors, and redolent as new-mown hay with the 
flowering hawthorn, even as we love the rich 
ripe glories of the summer, when the air is seen 
to tremble above the ground with the heat of the 
soil, and the rivers look cool as moonbeams in the 
blaze of day — when the crops undulate like a sea of 
gold upon the land — when the bean-flower and the 
clover make the fields as fragrant as gardens, and 
the birds are all merry as children to find that 
the earth's feast is spread. We love, too, in its 
turn, the mellower beauties of the autumn, when 
the world is gay as a painter's palette with the 
many colors of the woods, the orchards, and the 
l^lains — when the heads of the reapers are seen 
above each golden pool of corn — when the trees 
in the lanes have blades of wheat dangling from 
their topmost boughs, and the jangling bells of 
the harvest team sound cheerful as a marriage 
chime as the high-piled load of sheaves goes top- 
pling along the road. We love the broad crystal 
pavement of the sea as it lies smooth as a mirror 
encupped in the vast silver chalice of the horizon, 
and hived in by the grand pellucid cupola of the 
skies, even as we love the childish petulance of 
the streamlet, with the broken shadow of its rustic 
bridge quivering into long zigzag lines as the tiny 
tide sweeps under it, dimpled over with many an 



448 YOUNG BENJAMIN JFEANKLIN. 

eddy, and crumpled as silver tissue into many a 
curved and sj^arkling line. We love the ruined 
castle, with the weeds and brambles growing in 
the old banqueting hall ; and we love the neat 
cottage, with the roses dangling like balls of flo- 
ral fruit over the doorway. We love the broad 
expanse of nature as seen from the mountain-top 
when the earth seems like a little toy world at 
our feet, and the far-stretching sight gives one a 
faint sense of Omnipresence in the vastness of its 
range ; and we love the little picturesque bits of 
nature, like the gipsy camp with cave-like tent 
pitched in some sequestered lane, and the cal- 
dron swinging over the fire on its trivet of boughs, 
with the olive-faced crone in her tattered red 
cloak, filmed over with the white smoke, crouched 
beside it, and the old gray, shock-coated horse 
cropping the grass by the bank-side, and all 
arched in by the green vault of overhanging foli- 
age, through which the sunlight leaks in many 
a big lustrous drop, till the brown pathway is 
dajDpled as a deer's back with the mixture of 
light and shade. Farther, we love the rosy inno- 
cence and toddling helplessness of childhood even 
as we love the silver beauty of hale old age. 
Then, again, we love the birds of the wood and 
the grove — the little lark at morning, that we can 
hardly see in the dazzling of the sunbeam, trilling 
forth a very rapture of song as it lies bellied on 
the air with the warm sun shining on its back, 
and the nightingale in the night waking the still- 
ness with her notes, rich and resonant as an organ, 
and pleasant as the midnight music which reminds 
us of the Savior's birth. So again, too, we love 
the fine old ancestral air there is about the clamor 
of the rooks, the spectral-like whoop of the night- 
owl, the chime -like ding-dong of the cuckoo's 
ubiquitous cry, marking the first quarter of the 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 449 

year, and the sharp twitter of the black-backed 
swallows as they flash to and fro in fine forked 
flight over the surface of the pool before the 
thunder-cloud bursts upon the earth. We love 
the young lambs, too, with their white curly 
backs and baby-like bleat, as they run to the ewe 
and butt their heads against her side, or as they 
capriole for very gladness in the air; the hand- 
some square forms of the brown cattle, with their 
eyes as meek as slaves, and breath as sweet as vi- 
olets ; the patient old jackass, with his downcast 
head and black velvety snout, and the fine Stoic 
resignation with which he bears the jibes and 
cuflfs of the world ; and the faithful dog, whose 
tail is another tongue, and who can read his mas- 
ter's looks as we do books. Indeed and indeed, 
lad, there is not a source of pleasure in the wide 
range of animate and inanimate nature that is not 
a source of love also." 

" But, uncle," asked the little pupil, " you say 
love comes of gratitude ; are we then grateful to 
what you would call the stocks and stones about 
us, which ca7ibt help pleasing us whenever we find 
pleasure in them ?" 

" Yes, Ben," answered the teacher, " we are as 
grateful, in a certain degree, to them as we are to 
the mother who nurses us. Such is the abound- 
ing spirit of thankfulness implanted in the human 
breast, that there is not an object, however minute 
and however senseless, which delights us, that 
does not also inspire us with a sense of gratitude 
and ultimate love for it." 

" Well, do you know I thought, uncle," contin- 
ued the boy, " that we were only grateful to per- 
sons for favors ?" 

" Ay, lad, you thought so because the innate 
gratitude of our nature," the other made answer, 
"is then intensified by the consciousness that the 

F F 



450 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

favor conferred upon us is in such cases a volun- 
tary act. We know that the human being might 
have refrained from benefiting or pleasing us had 
he so willed, and therefore we feel inordinatehj 
thankful for the grace he has done us. But, Ben, 
you forget, my boy, that I have shown you that 
all our pleasures, whether sensual, intellectual, or 
moral ones, are really favors after all, since they 
were in no way necessary for the purpose of con- 
tinued existence, nor yet for the purposes of in- 
telligence and reasoning either ; and these are fa- 
vors conferred, too, remember, by a Being who 
might have w^illed othenoise. It would seem, 
therefore, as if it was an intuitive sense of this 
point that makes even the child and the savage 
love the flowers, and the brook-side, and the woods 
(and, therefore, feel the same instinctive gratitude 
for them) as naturally as the wisest and kindliest 
philosopher." 

" Oh, then, I see !" exclaimed the little fellow, 
thoughtfully ; " the love of nature is but the love 
of God, after all." 

" It zs, my son, the love of the beauty and good- 
ness of the Creator — the reverting of the mind to 
the one Great Cause of all our enjoyments, and the 
natural intuition we have that such enjoyments 
are pure favors or acts of grace to man ; and it is 
the consequent expression of our thankfulness for 
the bounty of the gift which insjoires, in its turn, 
a devout love of the All-bounteous Giver." 

" I can only say thank you both once more," 
murmured the boy, as he pondered over the high 
and holy thoughts that the old man had excised 
in his soul. 

" But the w^orld within us, Ben — the world of 
human thought and action, has as many sources of 
love as even the world of animate and inanimate 
nature itself. We love play, for instance, and we 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAKT. 451 

love work too, if we will but put our heart into 
the work — we love exercise, and we love rest — 
we love humor, and we love reason — we love sci- 
ence, and we love poetry — we love the flash of 
wit, and we love the solemnity of meditation — we 
love the ideal world of books, and we love the 
bright glimpses of that Avorld which we get in 
works of art — we love the romance of adventure, 
and we love the matter-of-fact of history — we love 
the bright-colored imagination of fiction, and we 
love the diamond purity and hardness of truth. 
Farther, if we love the sweet infection of cheer- 
fulness, we love also the sober gloom and pen- 
siveness of melancholy — if we love honor, we love 
humbleness also — if we have an innate love of 
power, Aveakness can, on the other hand, win our 
love as well ; and if we have a savage liking for 
pomp and splendor, we have, at the same time, 
an equally natural affection for the unadorned el- 
egance of simplicity. Again, we love praise, and 
we love good counsel, even though it have a touch 
of kindly blame about it — we love the strict equi- 
ty of justice, and we love the blessed indulgence 
of mercy — we love the lavish benevolence of char- 
ity, and we love, too, the wise thrift of frugality — 
we love wealth, and yet we can love the poor — 
we love chastity, and yet we have love enough to 
pity the frail — we love health, and we love the 
afflicted and the sick — Ave love the martyr, and 
the hero, and the great artist ; the philanthropist, 
the just judge, and the wise gOA^ernor. We love 
our parents and our children, our kindred and our 
playmates, our friends and benefactors, our neigh- 
bors and our countrymen ; ay, and we have hearts 
large and human enough to love the whole human 
race as well. And over and above all, we love 
the source of all love : the one great Friend, and 
Benefactor, and Father to us — Him Avho gave us 



452 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

the very power to comprehend his wisdom and 
his goodness, and the high faculty to love and 
adore Him for it." 

The uncle sat mute for a while after the com- 
pletion of the pa^an, and he covered his eyes with 
his hand as he remained rapt in the beauty of his 
own theme. 

" You now see, Ben," at length he resumed, 
" that if the brain of man can compass the entire 
universe, at least the heart has an equally compre- 
hensive power, and that the well-spring of man's 
love is as inexhaustible as the objects upon which 
it may be shed are infinite." 

"I see it is, uncle," answered the little man, 
thoughtfully, "and most wonderful it seems to 
me that it should be so." 

" Now, lad, of this same love," went on the old 
man, " there are several delicate gradations and 
shades — so delicate, indeed, that they are as diffi- 
cult to fix in words as it would be to give a name 
to each diflerent hair's-breadth of the rainbow 
bands of interblending hues. Ho av ever, mankind 
has invented a few such terms, and these may be 
said to indicate the tnore ^narked tones in what 
may be called the chromatic scale of love and af- 
fection. Starting, then, from utter indifference, 
which is the zero in the graduated scale, we have 
first the feehng of Respect^ which is that faint ad- 
miration and liking that we have for a person who 
ofiends no natural or moral law, who breaks no 
tie of kindred, who does no one any wrong, re- 
fuses no just demand, is distinguished for no par- 
ticular faculty, and marked by no particular vice. 
Such a person is what the world delights in so 
much, my lad ; ' a respectable man ;' an inoffensive 
creature, who, if he does no good, at least does no 
harm ; for a human being, like a poem or a pic- 
ture, or any other work of art which requires high 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 453 

powers to make it excellent, is just respectable 
when violating no rule of good taste, i)ropriety, 
or decency." 

" And what comes after respect, uncle ?" in- 
quired the youth. 

*' Why, Refjard^ lad," answered the other ; " and 
this, as I have before said, is merely that sweet 
and tender affection of our nature which leads us 
to look back with ideal delight upon some object 
that has really delighted us. It is simj^ly pleas- 
urable contemplation — the fond disposition we 
have to linger over and revert to any object which 
has interested us. This is the feeling we enter- 
tain for our neighbors and old schoolfellows, and 
even for the suffering, the miserable, and the af- 
flicted, as well as for the helplessness of age, wheth- 
er it be that of infancy or senility." 

" Well, and after regard, uncle ?" said little 
Ben. 

"Comes Esteem^ my boy — not as a necessary 
consequence, but in mere orderly succession," re- 
plied the elder one ; " esteem, which is the affec- 
tion we have for whatever is of service to us or 
others, and is difficult to obtain. It must be dif- 
ficult to obtain, Ben, or we should set no store or 
value upon the object ; and it must be of service, 
or we should have no regard or care for it. Hence 
you will see, my lad, that what is called esteem is 
simply a feeling of regard with a sense of value 
attached to it, and this, therefore, makes us loth 
to lose what is estimable. This is the affection 
which lies at the bottom of all friendship, since a 
true friend is one that never hesitates to serve us, 
and whose acquaintance we can never afford to 
lose. For a man to be really estimable there must 
be a certain amount of what is called '"xoortK 
about him ; that is to say, of qualities that are 
more or less valued and prized, in the mental and 



454 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

moral appraisement of the world, as being more 
or less serviceable to us, and which are not com- 
monly met with in the ordinary run of humanity. 
Thus, if we have merely a respect for that mental 
and moral negation — the respectable man — we 
have a positive esteem for the man of talent, and 
even the man of skill, as well as for the man of 
honor and the man of generosity. If we respect 
the just judge, we have an esteem for the lenient 
one. If we have a respect for the born poor, we 
have an esteem for those who are the architects 
of their own fortune." 

"You've done esteem now, haven't you, un-' 
cle ?" asked the little fellow, growing pleased with 
the rapid succession ; "and then w^hat have we?" 

"Why, Admiration is the next soft tone in the 
ascending scale of the tender passion," was the re- 
ply, " and this is simply the intense regard which 
objects of wonder and beauty combined force 
upon the soul, so that we are constrained to lin- 
ger over and dwell upon the contemplation of 
the extraordinary charms which have, as it were, 
transfixed us. Admiration is the highest pleasm-- 
able contemplation interblent with the most love- 
ly marvelment. Hence, to excite this feeling, two 
essentials must cohere in the object; the one is, 
that it must be an object of loveliness, and the 
other, that the loveliness must be so inordinate as 
to amaze us, for without these twin qualities no 
object can be really admirable. It must seem 
extraordinarily beautiful, pleasing, or good to us, 
in order to set us marveling in the midst of our 
enjoyment at the very rarity or uncommonness 
of the charms; for it is this delicious marvelment, 
Ben — this lovely wandering, and yet lingering of 
the thoughts over an object of high beauty, which 
makes up the state of mind that is usually called 
' rapture,' and which is, as it werej a deUghtful 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 455 

swooning — the sweet waking trance of the heart 
and intellect. Hence we do not admire the com- 
monplace qualities of mere respectability any more 
than we admire the simply estimable qualities of 
talent and worth ; but we do admire genius, and 
heroism, and sacrifice, and high personal and ar- 
tistic beauty, because they are the transcendent 
rarities, the supreme excellences of the world 
about us." 

" Go on, uncle," the boy exclaimed, as the old 
man came to another pause. " What folloAvs ad- 
miration ?" 

" Love^ Ben," the godfather made answer ; 
"love, of which we have said so much, and of 
which there are volumes still to say, if there were 
but time for the saying of it. Love follows ad- 
miration not only in regular succession, but gen- 
erally as a natural sequence too ; for admiration 
is but the first transient gleam of love, and love 
only the steady and enduring flame of long-con- 
tinued and permanent admiration. And it is this 
persistence of the emotion which develoi^s the two 
other tender elements that go to make up the one 
composite passion. It develops first a disposition 
not only to guard and protect the object of our 
love against injury, but also to cherish and benefit 
it in every way we can ; and, secondly, it develops 
a desire to possess it, to remain forever present 
with it — forever contemplating and forever ad- 
miring and enjoying it — forever guarding it, and 
forever cherishing, benefiting, and gladdening it. 
This is what is termed ' true love,' lad ; the love 
of swains, as well as the love of children for their 
parents, and the love of parents for their children ; 
the love of warm friendship, the love of high art, 
and the love of moral excellence, as well as the 
love of natural beauty and the love of God also. 
Kext in the scale we have — " 



456 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" What, uncle?" interjected the boy, determined 
not to be balked of his question. 

" HonoT^ lad," proceeded Uncle Ben. " Now 
honor is the admiration that we feel for any su- 
perior quality or excellence which develops a 
slight feeling of awe rather than love on the con- 
templation of it, so that the emotion wants the 
tenderness of admiring regard to cordialize it, and 
partakes rather of the modesty of wondrous re- 
spect. We honor our superiors; we honor the 
great, the wise, the powerful, the brave, the no- 
ble, the illustrious, and even our parents too. In- 
deed, we honor whatsoever impresses us at once 
with a sense of its superiority and our own inferi- 
ority. Hence there is always a certain submissive- 
ness and deference in the outward disj^lay of this 
feeling. It is the worldly Avorship that humility 
offers up to worldly pride and worldly dignity. 
The servant honors the master, the subject the 
sovereign, the world the conqueror, even as the lit- 
tle child honors its father, while it rather loves the 
mother that has tended, fostered, and fondled it." 

" Well, uncle," said the boy, " what now ?" 

"Why now, Ben, we have but to touch the 
highest note in the scale — the highest within the 
pitch and compass of the human soul, and thus to 
stand upon the topmost rung of the Jacob's lad- 
der, and look down upon the earth almost from 
the altitude of the heavens themselves." 

" And what is this highest note, uncle ?" the 
little fellow inquired, as he looked up in the old 
man's face, and felt almost the self-same feeUng 
stirring his heart. 

" V&nefiraUon^ Ben, veneration,"* said his god- 

* It is worthy of note that the three words zt'onder^ venera- 
tion, and honox are probably all etymologically identical, be- 
ing mere dialectic varieties of the same biliteral radical, w», 
vrt, or hn ; for that w and v are philologically the same, the 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 45T 

father ; " that fine, lofty, and composite emotion 
which is made up of the j^rofomidest regard, the 
highest admiration, the purest and yet warmest 
love, and the most intense honor; that reverent 
emotion which is usually associated not only with 
so strong a tendency to guard and protect the 
object of it from injury as to make us hold it ab- 
solutely sacred^ and to look uj^on the desecration 
of it as the highest crime, but also with so fervent 
a desire to be forever contemplating and admir- 
ing it, and forever lingering over its excellences 
and its marvelous greatnesses and graces, as to 
lead the mind to find its highest delight in the 
hymning of its praises and the heralding of its 
glories, such as occurs in what is commonly call- 
ed loorship. Moreover, there is at the same time 
connected with the emotion so deep a feeling of 
that submissiveness which is the outward expres- 
sion of honor, that an instinctive propensity comes 
upon the soul to humble ourselves before the ven- 

Saxon witan^ to show, and the Latin videre, to see — the Sax- 
on ivin, and Latin vinum, and a host of similar instances, are 
indisputable proof; and that ty or u is equivalent to the 
Greek a>, the Latin vendere, and Greek ojvtofiai, are sufficient 
to assure us ; even as wpa and hora, ojfiog and humerus, prove 
that the Greek a* and w are equal to the Latin ho. Wonder 
comes to us directly from the Saxon wondrian; veneration 
from the Latin veneror ; and honor (through the Latin) from 
the Greek ojvoq, value ; and the fundamental signification is 
to be found in the Welsh gioyn, i. e., what is white, fair ; that 
which affords happiness, and which is well known now to be 
the root of the Latin Venus (Welsh gwener) and venustas. 
The etymological trine, therefore, would appear to have sig- 
nified originally the emotion begotten by the perception of 
beauty, and to have had the idea of the worship which the 
highest beauty inspires afterward superadded by the Latins, 
and so to stand for veneration; and to have been restricted 
to the mere feeling of marvelment by the Saxons, and thus 
to mean wonder ; while the Greeks appear to have limited it 
to the mere value or high esteem in which excellence is al- 
ways held, as in honor. 



453 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

erated object, and to bow the head and bend the 
knee m its presence, and that from a sense of the 
very overpoweriugness of the grandeur of it. This 
subHme feeling, lad, which is the very ecstasy of 
the human spirit — the most intense, the most ele- 
vating, and yet the most humbling — the most pu- 
rifying, and, withal, the most impassioned and fer- 
vent of the many delights of which human nature 
is susceptible, is generally supposed to be given 
only to the Most High. But, though his tran- 
scendent greatness and wondrous excellence ex- 
alt the mind to the very highest pitch in the com- 
pass of the soul's fervor, nevertheless supreme 
worldly greatness and excellence may still excite 
the same feeling, though in an infinitely smaller 
degree. True, there is a strong tendency among 
weak and zealot natures to make idols of men 
and images, to bow the head and crook the knee 
to some golden calf, some dressed-up doll, or even 
to the purple and fine linen potentates of the earth. 
But, though there is no necessity, lad," said the 
honest and independent old Puritan, " to go down 
on the belly to any man any more than to a trump- 
ery toy, or to slaver over any bit of frail humani- 
ty like ourselves with ' your mightiness' or ' your 
excellency,' ' your reverence' or ' your grace,' any 
more than to offer up our worship to a block of 
ornate Avood symbolical of a saint, nevertheless, 
to the true magnates of human kind — doing the 
highest good, creating the highest human beauty, 
and displaying the highest 'genius and power of 
soul — we should be wanting in decency and grat- 
itude if we did not render to them the highest 
earthly homage of which the human heart is ca- 
pable; so that, always remembering that even 
they are men like ourselves, let us have all the 
manliness of men rather than the sycophantic zeal 
of zealots in our worship, but still be ready to lift 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 453 

the hat with the profoundest respect, and at the 
same time to love and honor, ay, and to revere the 
great artists, heroes, and martyrs, as well as the 
good Samaritans of the world. And now that the 
rosary of love is complete," concluded the old man, 
" do you tell the beads, lad." 

" First," said little Ben, as he placed the finger 
of one hand on the thumb of the other, so as to 
count the emotions off as he enumerated them, 
" there is respect, then comes regard, then esteem, 
then admiration, then love, and then — let me see, 
wdiat comes next ? oh, I know now ; then honor, 
and lastly veneration. Seven altogether ; the per- 
fect number among the ancients, wasn't it, uncle ?" 

" Yes, boy, the number of the days of the week, 
and the number of the planets," the answer ran. 
" Now that is the ascending scale of love and af- 
fection, Ben, and there is a similar descending 
scale running through all the phases of hate, 
scorn, contempt, etc., but this I must leave you 
to spell out for yourself." 

THE SELFISH EMOTIONS. 

" Well, uncle, and what are you going to do 
now ? I suppose we have done with the moral 
pleasures, haven't we?" asked the lad, quite inno- 
cently. 

"Done, my little man!" cried the teacher, with 
all the emphasis of profound astonishment ; "why, 
we've hardly begun. As yet we have taken only 
a broad general view of the whole class of feel- 
ings ; we have merely mapped them out, in the 
same manner as from a mountain-top we see a 
whole tract of country at one sweep of the eye, 
and we must now come down from our height, 
and examine the several parts of the view rapidly 
in detail. . There, you needn't be alarmed, lad," 
added the old man, as the little fellow resumed 



460 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

his paint-brush and began painting away again ; 
" I shall not be very long over the business." 

*' I'm not alarmed, uncle," exclaimed the boy. 
"I declare, I could sit and listen to you all the 
day long, alone with you here. Yes, uncle !" he 
added, by way of intimating to the old man that 
he was ready for his teacher to begin. 

" The best way, my little man," proceeded the 
godfather, " to open up the diiferent sources of 
our moral pleasures to you, is to commence by 
telling you that some of our moral feelings are of 
a selfish and others of an unselfish character; that 
is to say, we experience some of the emotions 
when any good or evil occurs or is likely to occur 
to ourselves, and some of them, on the other hand, 
when such good or evil occurs or is likely to oc- 
cur to others. As, for instance, we are thrown 
into a lively emotion of joy when any sudden 
or unexpected piece of good fortune happens to 
ourselves, even as we have a strong feeling of 
sympathy or pity on witnessing the misery or 
afflictions of others." 

" Oh, I see, some selfish and some unselfish," 
said the youth, half to himself, as he proceeded to 
scribble the words down as a " memP on the side 
of his drawing paper. " I wonder why I couldn't 
have found that out by myself, now ?" 

" Well, lad, I shall begin with a brief account 
of the selfish emotions," went on the tutor. 

" Oh, don't, imcle ; they're beastly things, I 
know," cried the youngster, "all about greedi- 
ness, and that sort of thing. Do you do the un- 
selfish ones first, unky, dear, for they're nice and 
pretty enough, I can tell, and leave the nasty self- 
ish lot to the last." 

The old man couldn't help laughing at the boy's 
simplicity; however, he was not to be moved from 
his purpose, so he proceeded as follows : 



A PEEP INTO THE IlEAKT. 401 

" The selfish emotions of our nature may be re- 
garded from three different points of view, Ben-, 
and hence they admit of being grouped into three 
distinct classes, according as they refer to the 
past, the present, or the future ; that is to say, 
according as the good or evil which is the object 
of them has occurred to us, either at some remote 
period, or but recently, or as it seems likely to 
occur to us at no very distant date." 

" I see," exclaimed the youth again, as he made 
another note on the margin of his sketch — " past, 
present, and future. Yes, uncle; and what are 
the feelings that you say refer to some past good 
on evil ?" 

"Why, lad, the very feelings of love and grati- 
tude, and all the rest (with their opposites) that 
we have been but recently considering," was the 
ansAver. 

" Oh, ay, so they are, of course. How stupid 
of me not to know that, to be sure !" exclaimed 
young Ben, still talking more to himself than to 
his uncle. " I see, they include all the different 
kinds of love — love of parents, children, friends, 
benefactors, neighbors, schoolfellows, and so on. 
Of course they do ; because the love one has for 
them must be on account of some good that they 
have done a chap some time before. I see ! I see ! 
Yes, uncle ; and which are the feelings that arise 
— how did you say it?" 

" That arise on the contemplation of some good 
or evil that is likely to accrue to us in the future," 
prompted Uncle Ben. " Why, lad, they include 
not only the emotions of hope and despair, and 
the sentiments of confidence and diffidence, as 
well as all the various feelings that arise in the 
bosom when we calculate the chances of any 
object of our desires or our fears happening or 
not happening to us, but they include also all 



463 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

those desires and fears themseKes ; and such de- 
sires of course may be as numerous and diiFereut 
as are the different objects of our love. Now this 
feeling of mental desire, Ben, is the yearning of 
the heart to possess some object which has either 
previously charmed it, or which it fancies is likely 
to do so, or else it is the heart's craving for some- 
thing which it wants, not for its own sake per- 
haps, but as the means of compassing some de- 
sired end. It is the excitement of this state of 
desire, physical or mental, which is the main- 
spring of all human action, Ben, and which stirs 
men to move their limbs in quest of what they 
want, as the steam stirs that wonderful new^ en- 
gine of Savery's to fling its iron arms about. The 
mental desire diflers only from the physical one 
in the fact that the precedent uneasiness, which 
is the immediate cause of the action, is in the 
physical state a purely physical result, as in the 
feeling of hunger, and the consequent desire for 
food ; whereas, in the mental desire, the uneasi- 
ness is purely an uneasy state of the mind rather 
than of the body. The mind, under such condi- 
tions, is continually thinking of the object which 
has charmed it, and which is to charm it again, 
and every other state of mind therefore becomes 
intolerable to it. It can not rest, from the very 
dissatisfaction that is on it. A longing, a yearn- 
ing, a craving is excited in the soul for the dar- 
ling object — the same as in the stomach when 
wanting food — and the human being must go 
seeking what it wants ; for we never desire, nor 
crave for, but merely vnsh for, those pleasurable 
objects which there is no probability of our ever 
possessing ; nor do we go in quest of those ob- 
jects of our desires, on the other hand, that there 
seems no likelihood of our ever attaining. When, 
however, it appears probable that they will come 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 463 

to our hands without any exertion on our part, 
why, then we sit and wait, look and long, expect 
and hope for them, with more or less patience or 
impatience, according as we have more or less phi- 
losophy, or according as the result appears to 
grow more or less hopeful, or the contrary." 

" How nice, plain, and clear it all comes — 
doesn't it, uncle ?" said the youth. 

"Hope,* lad," the godfather continued, "is one 

* The term hope comes to us directly from the Anglo-Sax- 
on verb Ilopian (Dutch Hoopen^ German Hoffen), the affini- 
ties of which are not very clear, Webster suggests that it 
may be connected wtth the Latin Capio ; but it may rather 
be derived from the Anglo-Saxon Hebban, to heave, to lift 
up ; for the Dutch Hoopen is not only to hope, but to heap. 
Hence hope would signify literally that exaltation or lifting up 
of the soul which comes of increased belief in the probability 
of our gaining some desired end ; and it is consequently the 
very opposite from that state o^ depression or dejection of spirit 
which ensues when we lose faith in obtaining some wished- 
for object, and which is usually termed Despondency. The 
Welsh term for hope is as fine a word as there is in any lan- 
guage: go-baith, which signifies literally seeing darklij . It is 
a pity that this fine old tongue is not more studied by philol- 
ogists instead of merely Saxon — as by Richardson (who has 
consequently wasted a life, and utterly spoiled a grand dic- 
tionary by its crude and trite etymologies) — and Latin and 
Greek only by others. The ancient British language, in- 
deed, appears to underlie the whole of the European forms of 
speech ; and Owen Pugh's dictionary is really a noble work. 
There is no moi-e curious and startling proof of the antiquity 
of the old British tongue than the fact that the word Pythag- 
oras, which we have always been taught to regard as the 
name of the earliest Grecian philosopher, is a Welsh word 
signifying simply "explanation of the universe." Hence it 
is plain that what was originally merely the title of a system 
of philosophy came to be mistaken for the name of the phi- 
losopher propounding it. Nor can we reject this notion by 
assuming that the Welsh title was derived from the Greek 
name, and so came to have its present signification, since the 
elements of the Welsh word exist in the Welsh language. 
Now it is evident that this could not have been the case had 
the term been derived from the name, since in our word Mac- 



464 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

of the sweetest, the most sustaining and comfort- 
ing feelings of the souL What bread is to the 
body, hope is to the spirit — the very staif of life. 
What oil is to the wound, hope is to the bruised 
heart — the anodyne that heals, lulls, and soothes. 
It is the one tiny bright star that is forever raised 
a little above the earth, and that seems to beckon 
us onward with its light-tipped wand, as it guides 
us along our darksome way. What would the 
life of man be without this blessed feeling of hope, 
Ben ? what but one long, lingering term in the 
condemned cell of the world, if we only kneAV that 
we came into existence with the sentence of death 
already drawn out and clutched in our baby-fist, 
and felt that there was really no hope of our life 
being spared beyond the allotted span ? 

" But sweet is the hope of the mother, as her 
little baby bud lies nestled in her lap, and she sits 
and sjoins hep aspirations for her little one into the 
most lustrous threads of life, weaving her wishes 
into the brightest and prettiest golden web of a 
fate for the child. How fine, too, the hope of 
ardent, beardless manhood, when the iron mass 
of circumstances encompassing our lives seems as 
easy to be cut through as water ! how grand the 
boi:)e of old age ; for, even though the force and 
weight of this same iron mass may have sorely 

adamize, neither Mac nor Adam are to be found in the English 
language in an elementary form signifying each a component 
part of the complex idea which is expressed by the compound 
term. In Welsh, however, pyth signifies universe, life, and 
corresponds dialectically with the Greek ftiog, and the Latin 
vita ; while agoras is explanation, from agori, to explain, 
which again is the equivalent of the Greek dyoptvix), to speak, 
a term found partly in our word all-egory. So that jiytk- 
{\xm\Q.rsQ)-ogoras (explanation) exactly makes up the com- 
plex idea, and hence the word must originally have been of 
Welsh extraction. It should bo added that the writer of this 
brief encomium on the Welsh language is no Welshman, 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 465 

bruised the spirit in the long wrestle with it, still 
the soul drinks in new life as it scents the morn- 
ing air of the immortal dawn, and sees, in the 
gloaming of the coming day, a long bright crack 
in the dark clouds, that tells of the wondrous 
splendor of the time to come." 

And as the devout old man said the words, he 
rose, almost unconsciously, from his seat, and stood 
with his head thrown back, looking far away into 
the skies. 

" Every different form of life, lad," went on the 
old boy, " has a different j^hase of hope connected 
with it. There is the hope of the young knight 
to win his sjDurs — the knights of those chivalrous 
arts which are forever battling for beauty — as 
there is the hope of the young poet and the young 
artist. Then there is the hope of the merchant 
looking for his ship ; the hoj^e of the sailor watch- 
ing for the land ; the hope of the maiden awaiting 
her lover ; the hope of the little child yearning for 
the promised treat ; and the hope of the school-boy 
as he counts the days on to the holidays ; the hope 
of the farmer, as he gazes up at the moon, and 
thinks of his thirsting crops ; the hope of the pris- 
oner, as he sees the jury leave the box to ponder 
over their verdict ; the hope of the gambler who 
has staked his all, while he watches the ball spin 
round and round, and then sees it tremble and 
vacillate about the ventured number upon the 
board ; and the hope of the young mother, as she 
looks into the doctor's eyes while he leans over 
the cradle of her little one, and feels its fluttering 
pulse ; ay, and even the hope of the murderer him- 
self, as he sees the sails unfurled, and the water 
begin to move past the hull of the vessel th^t is 
to bear him far away." 

" Oh, isn't it nice ? I think I hke this even bet- 
ter than what you said about love, uncle," ex- 
Gg 



466 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

claimed the little fellow, tickled with the pretti- 
ness of the subject. 

" Xor should we ever go in quest, lad, of such 
objects as seem to be within our own reach, or 
to be compassable by our own exertions," the 
godfather proceeded, " had we not the same hope 
of success as when we stand still, and watch what 
the tide, in the great sea of circumstances about 
us, will throw up on the shore at our feet. Now 
it is this hoj)e of success, or rather this faith m 
our own power to gain the end we desire, that 
is the mainspring and sustaining influence of all 
our energies while at work ; for if there was no 
abiding belief in our soul that we had the abiUty 
either to avert or overcome the obstacles that lie 
between us and the fulfillment of our desires, we 
should either sit and wait, and long for fortune 
to waft them to us, or else we should merely ut- 
ter a vague and vain wish that the object were 
in our possession, without having the heart to 
hope for it, or the energy to move either hand or 
foot in quest of it. Hope, faith, and work are 
the three great elements of all human action, lad, 
and in the social world they are as high virtues 
as even faith, hope, and charity are in the spiritual 
one. We couldn't bestir ourselves even to pluck 
the ripe fruit that dangles from the branch, Ben, 
if we didn't hope to succeed in our endeavors to 
tear it from the tree, or if we hadn't faith that 
our muscles would answer to our will, and that 
we had power sufficient to climb the trunk and 
wrest it from the bough. Self-reliance, Ben — that 
fine manly spirit of honest independence which is 
the true mark of every great nature — is the neces- 
sary^ consequence of faith in our own powers; and 
whatsoever serves to foster this, and to overcome 
the natural doubt, diffidence, and despondency of 
our spirit — whatsoever tends to stimulate us with 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAET. 467 

hope rather than to deaden and cramp our ener- 
gies with despair, as well as to strengthen ns 
with faith in ourselves rather than to take all the 
strength out of us by doubt of our own abilities 
whatsoever does this, lad, goes far toward mak- 
ing an honest, upright, self-sustained man of us, 
and to knock every atom of the cringing beggar 
or the filching thief out of our constitution. So 
I say to you, lad, have faith in yourself, faith in 
your own faculties, faith in your own nature, faith 
in your own intelligence, faith in the dignity and 
goodness of your own heart : faith without assur- 
ance, mind ! be full of hope, but lacking the pre- 
sumption of sanguineness ; and then rest assured 
this worldly faith of yours will lead to the same 
' good works' as even Christian faith itself." 

"Yes, I loill have this faith," cried the boy, 
roused by the fervor of the old man, who had 
spoken with all the ardor of his own independent 
Puritan spirit. " I will have faith that I can be 
all that you tell me, and oh, may my after life — " 

The uncle cut short the aspiration by adding, 
"May it be, lad, a bright instance to the world 
of a deep al3iding trust in that fine manly mag- 
nanimity that God has planted, more or less, in 
the nature of every one of us." 

The little fellow hung his head, and the words 
kept humming like the boom of a big cathedral 
bell in his brain. Not a word was spoken by 
either for many minutes. The uncle sat gazing at 
the lad of whom he had such high hopes, and 
watching the rain of the prayer sink deep into the 
hot and thirsting soil of his young heart ; for he 
knew and felt he had touched the one fine chord 
of young Ben's nature, and made it ring again 
with a strain that he w^ould never forget to his 
dying day. 

The boy only kept his eye fixed vacantly on the 



458 YOUNG BENJAMIN FIIANKI.IN. 

table, and sat gnawing the end of the pencil as 
his lips moved rapidly with the unuttered words 
of some inarticulate speech. 

" Well, Ben, we must jog along, for we have 
still some distance to travel," at length exclaimed 
the uncle, rousing the lad out of the trance that 
was on him. 

*' Yes, uncle," answered the little fellow, shak- 
ing himself as if he had really been asleep. 

"Well, lad, it would be idle to run over the 
several objects of our desires," resumed the teach- 
er, "since they are but the yearnings or out- 
stretchings of the different forms of love, of which 
we have already spoken so fully. Suffice it to 
deal only with those objects that we desire, not 
directly for their sake, but indirectly as the means 
(as I said before) of compassing some desired 

"I don't understand you, uncle," was all the 
little fellow said in return. 

" Why, boy, we desire money ^ not for money's 
sake," exclaimed the other — " unless, indeed, we 
have a miser's silly greed upon us — but merely 
because it is one of the chief means in the world 
of procuring what we want. So, again, we de- 
light in the exercise of our own x>oicer, not so 
much because we find a special pleasure in the use 
of it (for that, if carried to excess, is the tyrant's 
depraved delight, and the ambitious fool's fond 
mania), but because our own powers are what we 
have mainly to depend upon for our advancement 
in life, and because whatsoever serves to give us 
faith in them confers a high moral delight upon us. 
Then we desire liberty^ so as to be free to exercise 
those powers as we will — within, of course, all due 
bounds of propriety and respect; and whatever 
acts as a shackle on our limbs or a cord upon our 
will not only galls the flesh, but chafes and sores 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 4G9 

the veiy soul itself; it sets the whole nature winc- 
ing and smarting, till the continued irritation of 
the fetter makes it grow rebellious even to fury, 
and nerves us with an almost giant force and Avill 
to burst the fretting bondage. Farther, we desire 
security — the security of life and property against 
wrong and outrage ; for without this all our la- 
bor and our care would be useless, since it would 
be idle to desire the jDOSsession of any object that 
we loved ; idle to wish to guard and protect it 
against harm, or even to husband it ; idle to stir 
hand or foot to obtain it, if, after all our pains to 
gain it, the i^rize could be wrested from us, and 
our industry be rendered fruitless at the very mo- 
ment when the fruit was in our grasp. Even so, 
too, we desire to feel secure from bodily and men- 
tal injury as well as from moral wrong. More- 
over, we desire ease — not only ease of mind, and 
worldly ease, or a sense of comparative freedom 
from worldly care, but ease in the work which we 
have to do, in order to make our way in life, and 
hence we have an inveterate hatred of whatever 
seems to obstruct our progress by increasing the 
difficulties in our way through the world. Thus 
we find a special moral charm even in our own 
dexterity and expertness, as well as a fine moral 
satisfaction when, at the end of a long life of toil, 
"we have a sense that our own industry and thrift 
have enabled us to amass sufficient to procure for 
us all the little home-comforts we have been ac- 
customed to for the rest of our days, and that we 
have no necessity to continue laboring when the 
bones are aching, and the force spent with the 
heavy load of years on the back, nor yet to accept 
the beggar's dole of the poor-house. And farther 
still, we desire the love and good opinion of our 
neighbors, not only for its own sake, and because 
it is morally pleasing to our natures, but because 



470 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

it is another mode of enabling ns to make way in 
the world ; for when Ave look round and see how 
many advance by favor, and how few by special 
merit of their own, we soon get to understand 
that almost every man's lot is due nearly as much 
to the exertions and interest of the friends he 
finds and makes in life, as it is due to his own en- 
ergies, talents, and rectitude. Indeed, so much 
of human life and intercourse must depend ujDon 
trust, Ben, that not to be trustworthy is to sever 
our own individual link from the great chain, and 
so to put an end to our being dragged on by the 
rest. The love and good opinion of our neigh- 
bors, therefore, is desirable, boy, not only because 
it has been made naturally pleasant for us to re- 
ceive, but because it is essential ere we can be 
trusted, and ere we can receive any favor or help 
in our work from those about us. 

" Xow these, Ben, so far as I know," concluded 
the old man, " constitute the principal objects 
that we desire, not directly, for their own sakes, 
but, I repeat, indirectly^ as means to an end : 
money, power, hberty, security, ease, and good 
name. But every one of these sources of moral 
pleasure, I should warn you, may be abused, and 
transformed into the ugliest moral vices. We 
may love money, for example, till our very soul 
is jaundiced with the yellow earth, and we grow 
prone to go down on our bellies in worship of 
each golden calf in the land ; we may love it till 
we love to see the very color of our money plas- 
tered over our walls and on our chairs, our tables 
and sideboards, our lackeys' backs, our coach-pan- 
els, and our own bodies ; till even, like long-eared 
Midas himself, we may find no beauty in the 
wide world but in the precious brazen stufi". Nev- 
ertheless, Ben, money is not the ' filthy lucre' that 
your sentimental fools delight to terra it, but only 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 471 

filthy when used for filthy purjjoses. Money it- 
self, lad, is really neither a good nor an evil, but 
simply a means^ and therefore capable of being 
made either good or evil as we please, according 
as we choose to apply it to either a noble or a 
base object. So with power, too — we may de- 
light in the exercise of it till we get to feel the 
same proud pleasure in driving and curbing men, 
as a good horseman does in riding a fiery-natured 
steed, and in seeing, while he feels perfectly se- 
cure in his seat, the mettlesome bit of blood fret 
and foam at the mouth from the continued chaf- 
ing of the bit, and in feeling him plunge and rear 
beneath him at each fresh thrust of the spur or 
switch of the whip. Or, if we have a zest for the 
luxury of tyranny, we may still find a morbid 
pleasure in the sense of mastery, from the very 
adulation and fawning that the possession of pow- 
er begets among the sycoj)hants and serfs about 
us. The hollow, heartless voices of the world's 
toadies are positive music in the ambitious man's 
ear ; for the man of ' high ambition,' as it is call- 
ed, finds little pleasure in the exercise of power 
itself, but the sweetest possible delight in the 
court and obeisance that the world pays to the 
powerful. To his mean soul, the noblest sight in 
life is not a man standing erect as his Maker made 
him, upright in body as in mind, and instinct with 
all the fine, unassuming courage of true dignity, 
but crouching on his knees in the born beggar's 
attitude of abasement and supplication. Your 
'lord paramount' delights in this, because the 
moral hop-o'-my-thumb feels himself sixpenny- 
worth of halfpence higher from the contrast. 

" So, too, the love of liberty may pass into the 
love of unrestricted license ; the love of security 
of possession into the desire for absolute monop- 
oly ; the love of ease into the love of indolence ; 



472 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

and even the love of a good name into the most 
hateful of all vices — that wretched social hyjDoc- 
risy where people seek to get credit for virtue 
when they are really moral men of straw, making 
the moral world a world of mere trust — of high 
characters got upon tick — a world of tick godli- 
ness, tick kindliness, where there is no real bullion 
worth, but all flimsy jDaper-virtue ; where men un- 
derstand merely ' the representative value' of re- 
ligion, philanthropy, honor, and probity, without 
having any of the sterling metal in their coffers ; 
where all is lacker and varnish, French polish and 
veneer, rouge, cosmetic, and dyes, artificial flow- 
ers and wax fruit, pinchbeck and paste, masquer- 
ading and costuming, peacocks' feathers, shecjo's 
clothing, and lions' skins. Indeed, Ben, it is the 
easiest possible thing to ' affect heart ;' we can do 
this with even a paving-stone in our bosoms ; but 
we can't affect brains, lad, without having some 
little capital of intellect to trade upon. So the 
social hypocrites and Pharisees of our day are al- 
ways overflowing with love and charity, as if it 
were the very milk and honey of their hearts. 
Ah ! Ben, Ben, it only wants a halfpenny- worth 
of oil in the palm to be able to play the Good Sa- 
maritan any day." 

As the old man sat down to rest for a while, 
young Ben said, " Now you have finished the 
pleasures that refer to the past and the future, 
and are going, I suppose, to do those which refer 
to the present ?" 

" Ay, lad, we have reviewed the retrospective 
and the prospective moral emotions of our nature," 
was the reply, " and so, of course, are ready to pass 
on to what are called the immediate feelings ; and 
they are so called because they arise, not from the 
contemplation of some retrospective or prospect- 
ive good or evil, but simply from the sense of 



A PEEP INTO THE HEABT. 473 

some present benefit or injury happening imme- 
diately to us." 

"Yes, uncle," chimed in the little fellow; "and 
what are the names of some of these ; for, do you 
know, I never can think of one of them before you 
mention them to me. Isn't it strange ?" 

"Why, there are the emotions oiJoy and 8or- 
roiL\ Ben," the imcle continued, " with the conse- 
quent tempers or continuous moods of mind that 
they often leave behind them, and which are call- 
ed Cheerfulness and Melancholy^ even as there is 
the delight or sense of Complaceyicy that we feel 
upon success, together with the emotion of what 
is called Exultation at our triumph over the dif- 
ficulties which beset us, as w^ell as the opposite 
emotion of Dejection., or sense of Discomfiture^ 
that we experience upon Failure.'''' 

Little Ben Avriggled away at the roots of his 
hair with the tip of the j^encil in his hand, as 
much as to say, " Now why couldn't I have 
thought of that ?" 

" Well, my little fellow," went on the mentor, 
" of the high pleasure oljoy and the intense pain 
of Sorrow it would be almost idle to speak, since 
they are obviously pleasurable and painful states 
of mind. Sufiice it to say, that when these in- 
tensely vivid feelings are rendered even more in- 
tensely vivid than usual by the inordinate excite- 
ment of some surprise or shock in connection 
with them, they have often been known not only 
to craze the mind, but even to deprive the person 
of life then and there. However, the emotion, or 
rather the temper — that is to say, the prolonged 
and gentle excitement — oi cheerfidness (as well as 
the opposite state of continuous and mild depres- 
sion GSiWed m.ela?icholy)^ is sufficiently remarkable 
to warrant a few words. It is the characteristic 
of many of those peculiarly vivid states of mind 



474 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

which are called emotions or passions, that, when 
the first wild excitement has passed away, they 
leave behind them a permanent and kindred state 
of mind of so subdued a form that it is neither a 
transient passion nor emotion, but merely a pro- 
longed temper or mood. It is, as it were, the 
trail of light Avhich follows the meteor — the faint 
hum of the bell after the bewildering clang of the 
stroke has passed away. Thus Wonder is the 
temper or mood of mind that Astonishment or 
Surprise often subsides into ; so Tetchiness or 
Peevishness is the disposition that is prone to 
follow Anger, and general Tenderness the conse- 
quence of Love, or rather it is the mark of a lov- 
ing nature, even as Cheerfulness is the temper be- 
gotten by Joy, and Melancholy that which sets in 
after Sorrow. Such tempers, however, I should 
tell you, are often the effects of a peculiar state 
of body or organization, and hence the j^ersons 
so constituted are habitually cheerful, tetchy, or 
tender-hearted, and so on ; but in such conditions 
the mental moods are Xho, forerunners rather than 
the after-states of the emotions to which they be- 
long, and thus tetchiness becomes a sign of a pre- 
disi^osition to anger, tenderness to love, and cheer- 
fulness to joy, even as a melancholy temperament 
(as the bodily state is termed) is a mark of prone- 
ness to grief" 

" Oh, then, that's what we mean when we say 
'Father's in a bad temper to-day,' or he's in a 
good one, as it may happen," cried the little man, 
delighted with the burst of light. " I see now, 
it means merely that he's ready to be pleased or 
vexed with whatever occurs at home. Of course 
it does. But go on, uncle, please." 

" Now, my boy," he proceeded, in obedience to 
the request, " 1 have spoken of these tempers in 
order to point out to you how much of human 



A PEEP IJ^TO THE HEART. 475 

happiness depends upon them, and how necessary- 
it is, even for our pleasure, to cultivate the good 
tempers and to check the bad ones ; for as they 
are permanent states of more or less vividness of 
feeling, and our emotions themselves are only the 
temporary flash of human passion, they of course 
are the ugly, rankling festers, and the others only 
the momentary sharp stings ; the one the long dis- 
ease, and the other the instantaneous wound ; so 
that he who wishes to live a happy life must train 
himself to be of a happy and cheerful temper." 

" Yes, uncle, it's all very well to say ' train him- 
self to be of a cheerful temper,' " argued the young 
monkey ; " but if, as you say, cheerfulness comes 
either from joy, or from what you call a certain 
state of the body, how is a person to train him- 
self to be continually in a state of joy, I should 
like to know, or to be in the precise state of body 
wanted for the temj^er ? I've always heard moth- 
er say such and such a child is naturally of a good 
temper, so that I should think our tempers are 
born with us." 

The old man smiled at the boy's argument, for 
he was so stanch an advocate for liberty of con- 
science that he delighted to hear, and, indeed, had 
always let the lad speak his thoughts freely to him. 
" True, lad," he said, in answer, " we are all born 
with what the doctors call a certain bodily tem- 
perament,* and this naturally begets in the mind 

* Physicians enumerate four distinct kinds of tempera- 
ment : 1. The sanguine (or hopeful). 2. The choleric (or pas- 
sionate). 3. The melanclioly (or sorrowful). 4. The phleg- 
matic (or sluggish). The sanguine temperament is generally 
marked by a ruddy complexion ; the choleric and melanchol- 
ic temperaments, on the other hand, are mostly of a darker 
hue; while the phlegmatic is more or less white or pale. 
The sanguine appears to have a large quantity of the red 
coloring matter of the blood in the system ; the choleric and 
melancholic an excess of bile ; and the phlegmatic an excess 



476 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

a particular mood or temper corresponding with 
it — that is to say, a proneness or predisposition 
for particular emotions and fancies. And it is 
also true, lad, that the emotion of joy is not a 
voluntary state of mind, but one that we are sud- 
denly thrown into by certain occurrences in the 
world about us. Nevertheless, we can train our 
mind, Ben, to certain habits of thought ; for we 
can educate it to see the beauties rather than the 
ugly blemishes of things ; we can render it quick 
to detect the goodness, and slow to discover the 
evil in life ; w^e can bring it, by long schooling 
and watching, to find some virtue in the meanest 
thing, and to prefer the contemi^lation of the one 
little bit of merit to the crowd of vicious defects 
in even the basest of our fellow-creatures. This 
is what is termed looking at the bright side of 
things ; and depend upon it, Ben, even though 
the new moon apj^ears but a dark ball to us, if 
we could but regard it from a difierent point of 
view, we should find it still the same brilliant bit 
of chastity as we see it when the bright side is 
turned toward our eyes. This better view of 
things is what is styled charity in religion ; it is 
poetry in art, chivalry in the code of honor, ele- 
gance in matters of taste, and politeness in mere 
manners. Train your mind, then, lad, to see only 
the beauties, the nobilities, the virtues, and the 
graces of the world, and to turn the eye from the 
uglinesses, meannesses, and clumsinesses of hu- 
man nature, and rest assured, Ben, your life will 
be one continued state of joy and cheerfulness. 

of lymph, or water in the srstem. Or, in the language of 
Liebig's theory of respiration, we may say that the iron in the 
blood of temperament No. 1 is highly oxydized, whereas in 
that of temperaments No. 2 and 3 it is insufficiently oxyd- 
ized, while in temperament No. 4 the blood has but little iron 
in it to oxvdize. 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 477 

Close your ear, too, lad, to that wretched huckster 
and attorney creed which would have us believe 
all men rogues till we find them honest people, 
and be you at least gentleman enough, my little 
man, to regard all men as gentlemen till you find 
them blackguards. Do this, boy, and you will be 
sure to gather a goodly company of gentlemen 
and friends about you. This is the honest, cheer- 
ful view of the world, lad, and we have Christ's 
own word for it that the hypocrites are the men 
of ' sad countenances.' " 

" Yes, I remember, uncle," the little fellow 
chimed in, "He says so in the Sermon on the 
Mount : ' Be not, as the hypocrites, of a sad coun- 
tenance.' " 

The uncle merely nodded and said, " Ay, lad, 
your solemn-faced Pharisee is as difierent from 
the heavenly bringers of the ' glad-tidings' of the 
new light as is the morose old screech-owl from 
the sweet-voiced little lark. But, Ben, I spoke to 
you before of the sioeet infection of cheerfulness, 
and I now Avish to imj)ress upon you that another 
special reason why we should cultivate a good and 
cheerful temper is because of the very infectious- 
ness of happiness itself Laughter is as catching 
as the measles, lad ; and rely on it, as the sight of 
one person yawning will set the jaws of a whole 
company on the stretch, so one pleasant smiling 
face will breed a hundred other smiles. One 
cheerful countenance in a roomful of lugubrious 
ascetics is really as genial as a bit of God's own 
sunshine falling upon a sick man's bed ; it is liglit 
and life too ; and it is impossible to continue mor- 
bid with that in the room. What a power of 
diffusing happiness, then, has every one in his own 
heart, if he will but train himself to the use of it ! 
"Why, if we had the wealth of Croesus, Ben, and 
the charity of the early Christians to boot, no 



478. YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

alms that we could dispense would shed half so 
much comfort upon those about us as we have it 
in our power to bestow, if we will but look at 
the brightness of creation, and feel and enjoy this 
brightness in our heart till it beams again in our 
own face, and thus make others feel and enjoy it 
in theiT hearts, and wear it in their faces too. 

" But if we have the power to make so many 
happy at so little cost by the mere charm of 
cheerfulness," he went on, "think, on the other 
hand, my good lad, what a vast amount of human 
misery we can cause by giving way to bad temj^er. 
Indeed, there is no home curse like this ; nothing 
that Scares the household gods from so many 
hearths ; for there is no tyranny of kings or em- 
perors so hateful or so cruel, and none so cowardly 
either, as that of the home despot ; for bad tem- 
per wreaks its rage only on the helpless ; ay, and 
though the ' brief madness' is supposed to be un- 
governable, it can — even in the very 'tempest 
and whirlwind,' as Shakspeare calls it, of its pas- 
sion — check the fury that is on it in an instant 
so as to be civil and soft-spoken enough to any 
whose favor it dreads to lose. So, if it be only 
to avoid the terrible devilry of a bad temper, I 
say again to you, Ben, cultivate the fine homely 
Christianity of a good one." 

" I shall remember it, you may depend," cried 
the boy, as he again scribbled something down on 
the paj)er before him, and then said, " That's all 
you're goinoj to say about cheerfulness, I suppose, 
FncleBen?" 

" It 2*5, my child," the rej)ly ran ; " and now 
only a few words about the pleasures of success, 
and the emotion of Exultation, and then we have 
finished with the selfish emotions of our nature." 

" But don't you remember, uncle, you told me 
a lot about success before ?" the boy reminded his 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAKT. 479 

godfather. " You said, when you were speaking 
of art, that we found a pleasure in succeeding even 
in the smallest things, such as balancing a straw 
on the nose, or in walking along the cracks in the 
pavement, or indeed, you said, in hitting any mark 
we aim at. I recollect it well." 

"I recollect it too, now, boy," the other return- 
ed, " and I think I said at the time that the pleas- 
ure we felt was always in proportion to the diffi- 
culties overcome, and that it was simply the de- 
light that all people experience in overcoming 
great difficulties which led some men to practice 
the difficult feats of dancing on the back of horses 
at full gallop, swallowing swords, and drinking 
glasses of Avine while balancing themselves on 
their head a-top of a long pole." 

" Oh yes, so you did, uncle," the youth chimed 
hi, " for I remember thinking how true it all was 
when you said so." 

"Well, Ben," the old man added, "this delight 
in overcoming difficulties is simply the emotion 
oi Exultation ; and though it may be applied to 
small things, it is, when rightly directed, one of 
the finest emotions of the human soul. I spoke to 
you of the grand peaceful conquests of Art when 
I was discoursing of the artist power, and the love 
we had for it. But Science has its peaceful con- 
quests as well as Art, and they are no whit less 
grand. I never see that wonderful steam-engine 
at work down at our docks but I think what must 
have been the inventor's feeling when he first be- 
held the iron giant move in obedience to his will; 
when he found that he had really breathed the 
breath of life into the metallic monster, and given 
it all the action, and made it instinct with all the 
power of the Titan race of old. Surely there must 
have been a smack of divinity in the emotion that 
then stirred his spirit. Or did he tremble at the 



480 YOUNG BEIS^JAMIN FRANKLIN. 

sight of his own handiwork as he beheld it puls- 
ing like an iron heart, and snorting forth its steamy- 
breath, and did he think it as impious as Prome- 
theus' daring when he stole the fire from heaven ? 
Or did he feel, as a really wise man would, that 
it was God's will, and not his, that was really 
stirring the mighty engine after all, and that he 
had merely learned to spell out another passage in 
the great poem of the fitness of things ? I can't 
say how your old uncle would have felt under such 
circumstances, Ben, though I am afraid he would 
have been weak enough to have burst into a hymn 
of self-glorification, and have indulged in a little 
bit of trumpery self-worshi]). But I hope the fine 
fellow who made the first steam-engine didn't do 
this. I hope he merely felt the suj^reme delight 
of conscious power. I hope he felt, as he sat down 
before the mechanic ofispring of his genius, and 
watched it pufl" and gasp, labor and heave, as it 
became quick with the force within it, that he had 
the power of a giant in his brain, and that he had 
used it like a sage ; that he could make the might- 
iest forces in the world as docile as turnsj^it-dogs 
at his will ; that he could tame even the fire and 
the flood to do his bidding ; and that he had learn- 
ed how to make arms of brass and sinews of iron 
do the mere brute labor of the world for the poor 
weary laborers among mankind. I say I hope he 
felt merely the fine glory of peaceful triumph — 
the high honor of his trumpetless victory over 
the elements of nature ; and I hope, for the sake 
of humanity, he didn't mentally fall to clapping 
his own hands at his own conceited self, or blow- 
ing an ideal trumpet into his own ear, and prov- 
ing how small a man he really was by fancying 
himself a really great one ; for this, Ben, is the 
weakness of exultation, and not the grandeur of 
it. The exultation of high genius is not the ex- 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 4S1 

tiltation of the hero, not the triumph of man over 
man, bnt the triumph of mind over matter. It is 
the conquest of circumstances that stirs the intel- 
lectual hero's heart, the mastery of difficulties that 
sends a thrill of glory through his nerves ; and as 
there is no power on the earth so great as that 
of genius, so is there no exultation so pure and so 
nolble as that which true genius feels when it has 
done its work, and wants no other reward but the 
mere satisfaction of the work itself — the high 
sense of mastery unalloyed with the degradation 
of slavery." 

THE UNSELFISH EMOTIONS. 

" What are you going to do now, uncle ?" ask- 
ed the little fellow, directly he saw that the old 
man had finished another portion of his theme. 

" Why, now we come to the '?<;iselfish emotions 
of human nature," was the rejoinder. 

" I think you said sympathy or pity was one 
of these — eh, unele ?" little Ben inquired. 

The old man answered merely, " I did, Ben ;" 
and then fell to pondering«rhat was the best way 
of making out his subject. Presently he went 
on, saying, " Some persons, I should tell you, lad, 
have denied the very existence of this class of 
emotions in man. They assert that the conduct 
ijphich appears unselfish is merely the most pru- 
dent and enlightened of all selfishness. They say 
that we sympathize with, and delight to relieve 
the suffiaring merely because we derive the high- 
est pleasure from the act." 

" Do they, though !" exclaimed the boy, who 
was evidently taken aback with the force of the 
argument ; " and isn't it so, uncle ? I really don't 
see how it's possible to get over thatP 

The godfather laughed at the little man's sim- 
plicity as he cried, " Why, you little goose, can't 
Hh 



482 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIX. 

you see that thougli it may be mere selfishness 
that makes us relieve those with whose sufferings 
we sympathize (because in sympathy we suffer 
all the miseries of the objects of our pity), never- 
theless, it can't be selfishness that makes us sym- 
pathize with them? Is it selfishness to suffer 
with them, and to suffer like them ?" 

" ISTo, of course it isn't," the little fellow said ; 
"I teas a goose not to be able to see that, cer- 
tamly !" 

*' When we symjDathize," the other continued, 
" of course the mere love of promoting our own 
happiness makes us desire to relieve our own fel- 
low-sufferings ; and as that can only be done by 
relieving the original sufferings which caused 
them, of course we can not choose but act as our 
pity dictates. But still it was no love of our own 
happiness, Ben, that engendered in us the feeling 
of commiseration itself; for, riddle it out as skep- 
tics may, the emotion which causes us to suffer 
others' sufferings — to share in their misery — to 
take part in their afflictions, is, and must be, in 
the very nature of things, utterly unselfish., and 
therefore there are such things as unselfish emo- 
tions. Q.E.D.,"* added Uncle Ben, with a small 
chuckle, as if he had vanquished some imaginary 

"What's Q. E. B., uncle?" demanded th^u 
youngster. 

" Q. E. J9., Ben," the old man corrected him ; 
" oh, nothing, lad — merely a bit of scholastic ped- 
antry, that's all. Now, first, Ben, I must tell 
you that we find certain kinds of pleasure in af- 
fecting our fellow-creatures ourselves in a partic- 
ular manner, and certain other kinds of pleasure 
when they are so affected, but not by ourselves. In 

* Q.E, 'D.=-"uod erat demonstrandum: Angl., which was 
to be proved. 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAKT. 483 

some cases we find delight in doing them some 
good, or even some evil tm'n ourselves, and in 
others the emotion springs merely from our con- 
templation of the good or evil which has befallen 
them, and in om* participation of the consequent 
joys or sorrows. I shall begin with describing 
to you the pleasures that we experience when we 
ourselves confer any good or inflict any evil upon 
our fellow-creatures. First of all, then, we find a 
curious pleasure even in producing a simple im- 
pressi07i upon people, without regard to the im- 
pression being agreeable or disagreeable. This 
is what is termed the delight of causing a ' sensa 
tion,' of producing an ' impression,' or creating a 
' noise in the world.' True, most people prefer to 
make a favorable or agreeable impression ; still, 
it is an acknowledged fact that there are certain 
morbid natures that even destroy themselves in 
some wild and extravagant manner merely with 
the view of drawing public attention to them ; 
others, again, indulge in some strange eccentricity 
of dress or manner ; and others live strange lives, 
or in strange places, merely to make themselves 
* outre^ as the saying goes, or, in plain EngUsh, to 
render themselves remarkable ; while some prefer 
even the notoriety of the felon's dock, and the un- 
enviable conspicuousness of a death upon the gal- 
lows, rather than suffer the utter insignificance of 
public disregard ; even as there are other morbid 
natures that feel dehght, not in producing a mere 
impression upon others, but in having this mere 
impression made upon themselves, such as the 
collectors of those morbid curiosities which are 
usually made u]3 of hangmen's ropes, murderers* 
clothes and knives, or of some horrible ' identical 
axe,' and the like, though perhaps one great in- 
centive to the formation of such ghastly museums 
consists as much in the desire to produce a mere 



4S4 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

impression upon others as to have such an impres- 
sion produced upon themselves." 

" I never knew that people had such feelings 
before," remarked the boy. 

"Then, Ben, there is the pleasure we feel in 
com7nunicati7ig our oimi feelings to others^'' con- 
tinued the teacher. " I have before sj^oken to you 
of the unselfish character of intellectual delight, 
and pointed out to you how, when we are charmed 
Avith the beauty of some new truth, or fine figure 
of speech, or the wit of some startlingly good joke, 
we positively long for another bosom to share the 
pleasure with us ; and now I should tell you that 
it is nearly the same instinctive propensity that 
makes certain people spend large sums of money 
in printing — without any regard to profit — the 
works of some favorite author, and others devote 
months, and even years, to writing certain books 
from which they can never hope to receive the 
least emolument. But there is no more marked 
instance of the general desire among mankhid to 
communicate their own feelings to others than is 
to be found among zealots, who are mostly so 
eager and rabid to make all the Avorld think and 
feel as they do, that they are ready even to put 
to torture those who refuse to be of their way of 
thinking. The desire to convert and i^roselytize 
— indeed, the propensity for tract-printing, for Gos- 
]oel-propagating, and mission-instituting, springs 
merely from the innate wish of the more earnest 
portion of mankind that the entire human race 
should feel the blessed delight, as well as share 
the grace of that creed which they themselves 
feel to be the greatest blessing and grace ever 
vouchsafed to man. 

"Again, it is this disposition to make others 
feel the same joy that we feel which gives rise to 
the custom there is among nobles and squires to 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAET. 4S5 

feast the villagers and peasants upon the occasion 
of their marriage, or the birth of an heir ; or the 
coming of age of their eldest son, and so forth. 
Farther, it is the same desire to rejoice in com- 
mon that is the cause of public jubilees in celebra- 
tion of some great national good ; and the same 
principle holds good even down to the harvest- 
homes, and Christmas festivals, and May -day 
games of the people." 

"Isn't it curious!" murmured the youth. 

" Next, lad, there is an instinctive propensity 
in our nature," Uncle Ben jDroceeded, " not only 
to share our own happiness with our fellows, but 
also to share our advantages Avith them at the 
expense of our own gains ; in other words, there 
is a natural desire to benefit others. There can 
be no doubt that we would rather have the whole 
world happy than miserable, Ben, provided it cost 
us nothing to make it so, and the mind be in a 
sane condition. Assuredly, in a natural state of 
things, every one in his heart wishes every one 
w^ell, and it is only the petty greeds, rivalries, jeal- 
ousies, and heartburnings of our nature that inter- 
fere with the operation of this aspiration, which 
is merely the utterance of the native benevolence 
of our souls. If we admit that there is an innate 
tendency to feast those about us when we our- 
selves ex23erience any unexpected or unusual hap- 
piness, or, in other words, to make those about us 
rejoice merely because we ourselves are full of 
joy, surely we must allow that the innate propen- 
sity of the human heart is not alone to compass 
our own happiness, but also to share that happi- 
ness with others, more ^particularly if we can do 
so without any sacrifice being required on our 
part. Moreover, misery, squalor, and bodily suf- 
fering are such naturally ugly things to us, that 
even our.instinctive love of the beautiful and the 



486 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

agreeable is sufficient to make us prefer universal 
well-being to universal pain and gnashing of teeth ; 
so that It is manifest that the benevolent princi- 
ple, when uncontrolled by any petty private inter- 
est, or any savage revengeful passion, is a marked 
attribute of our nature, and lies at the very bot- 
tom of the human heart. But if we are naturally 
benevolent to those who have never wronged or 
injured us (as we are and can be malevolent to 
those who have)^ surely we can advance a step 
farther, and say we have an instinctive propen- 
sity to benefit those fellow-creatures who are nei- 
ther friends nor foes to us. I do not mean," pro- 
ceeded the old man, " that we have an innate de- 
sire to relieve suffering, for that proceeds, as we 
have seen, from our instinctive disposition to com- 
miserate, or, in other words, to share the misery 
of others ; but I do mean that we are disposed to 
benefit and j^romote the good of our fellow-beings 
merely for the sake of benefiting them, and be- 
cause we find a greater pleasure in the contem- 
plation of human misery than in witnessing hu- 
man misery. Of course this desire to benefit is 
continually restrained by a number of conflicting 
emotions," the uncle added, " and more particu- 
larly by our desire to promote our own happiness, 
as well as by our natural disposition to guard and 
husband our own possessions, and to treasure up 
what we love and esteem. But that there is such 
a benevolent and benefactive impulse in human 
nature is demonstrable from the very moral beau- 
ty of goodness, and the moral ugliness of evil ; for 
that which is morally beautiful to us we can not 
but prefer to see prevail rather than that which is 
morally ugly, even as we instinctively prefer sun- 
shine to darkness, and harmony to discord. In- 
deed, if there were no innate disposition to bene- 
fit, there could never have been a pure benefit 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 487 

rendered in the world — that is to say, a good act 
done to a fellow-creature for the mere sake of the 
goodness ; for in that case it would either be a 
voluntary act done without any cause to determ- 
ine the volition, or else the act itself must be re- 
ferred to some purely selfish motive, which is ab- 
surd, since to promote the good of another at the 
sacrifice of our own personal good is to be un- 
selfish ; and if, on the other hand, it be urged that 
we do so because the good of others delights us, 
or, in other words, that it is merely selfishness on 
our part, after all, that causes us to confer the 
good on them, then the answer is, How, if we are 
purely selfish, can the good of others delight us, 
since to find delight in good that is not our own 
good is to love goodness for its own sake, and 
hence it is to have a pure unselfish love of it." 

This was said with all the air of an old contro- 
versial divine ; indeed, in his youth, Uncle Ben 
had delighted in disputation, and still nothing 
pleased him more than to break a friendly lance 
with any one on the pet subjects of his'^heart; 
and often he and his brother Josiah would sit by 
their hearth, and play a game of logical chess, as 
it were, while they discussed some of the old sub- 
tleties of the schoolmen, as to whether the angels 
could pass from one point of space to another 
without going through the intermediate places, 
and whether space itself was an entity or a quid- 
dity, as well as trying to unravel the nice knotty 
tangle of " Liberty and Necessity," when Josiah 
would stand out hard for " Predestination," while 
the more liberal brother would take up the cud- 
gels in favor of free agency, and try to split the 
fine metaphysical hair as to whether foreknowl- 
edge necessarily implied foreordinance. 

"I can hardly follow all you say, uncle," ob- 
served little Ben, as he chewed the cud of the old 



488 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

man's syllogism; "but it seems to me that vre 
must love goodness for goodness' sake, as you 
call it, just as we love truth for truth's sake, and 
beauty for beauty's sake." 

" Of course we do, lad," cried the other ; " and 
if we have a pure unselfish love of goodness and 
truth, then, I say again, we have a pure love of 
promoting the good of others, or, what is quite 
the same thing, an utterly disinterested desire to 
benefit them. However, perhaps the most con- 
vincing proof of the existence of this innate be- 
nevolence of our nature is to be found in the fact 
which nobody doubts, and none have ever at- 
tempted to gainsay, viz., that there is an instinct- 
ive spirit of malevolence in the human heart, and 
that we desire to injure, and love to inflict evil 
upon those whom we believe to have wronged 
us, or even interfered with the attainment of our 
wishes." 

" Oh, uncle, don't tell me, after all the fine 
things you've been saying about human nature, 
that we have such feelings at all," little Ben ex- 
claimed, for he had begun to look upon the heart 
of man with the same fond eyes as a mother gazes 
at the babe in her lap, and he couldn't bear to 
think it had got even one little blemish about it. 

" Don't tell you !" shouted Uncle Benjamin ; " of 
course I loill tell you, boy. Do you think I wish to 
build up a barley-sugar palace of a world for you ? 
Do you think I wish to fasten a pair of goose- 
wings on your back, youngster, and lead you to 
believe that you — little devil as you can be — are 
a perfect angel ? No, lad !" and he thumped the 
table as he said the words ; " you are not an an- 
gel, only an angel in the bud ; a creeping, crawl- 
ing human grub, that may one day be a winged 
butterfly. The human heart, Ben, is picked out 
all black and white, like a chess-board, with the 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 489 

strong contrast of opposing passions — passions 
for good, and passions for evil as well ; and I say 
again, the very fact of their being a malevolent 
principle in our soul is proof conclusive of there 
being a benevolent one also to counterbalance it. 
Hence, lad, the next moral pleasure we have to 
deal with is the pleasure toe find in injuring oth- 
ers. Some believe that there are people of an in- 
nately cruel nature, who delight in torturing for 
the mere sake of the pleasure they derive Irom 
the contemplation of the torments — that is to say, 
in torturing those who have never offended them 
— not because the torturers have any savage de- 
sire for revenge upon their soul, but simply be- 
cause the evil, the pain, and the anguish are agree- 
able to their nature. Now I don't believe that 
such ' depraved' nature, as this is termed, is possi- 
ble in the very nature of things. It is impossible 
that ugliness can be beautiful, Ben. Some, in- 
deed, may think that beautiful which we hold to 
be ugly ; still, it is not ugliness to them^ but beau- 
ty instead. So, lad, pain, even in another, never 
can be pleasure to us ; for it is part of God's ordi- 
nation that the sight of pain in any feeling thing, 
directly it impresses us with a sense of the pain, 
should give rise to a feeling of sympathy or pity 
in the beholder, and this has been rendered so 
naturally pahiful and distressing to us as to induce 
us to seek to put an end to the sufferings which 
originally excited it." 

" Well, but, uncle, I remember some boys at old 
Brownwell's school," urged young Ben, " who al- 
ways seemed to me to be naturally cruel, and used 
to ill-treat — oh, so dreadfully, you don't know ! — 
the poor dumb animals that mother always taught 
us to be kind to." 

"Yes, lad, I know," the uncle continued ; "boys 
will tear off flies' legs and wings, tie kettles to 



490 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

dogs' tails, put cats' feet in walnut-shells, and com- 
mit a host of other atrocities, even as grown peo- 
l^le will go to executions, and find dehght in gaz- 
ing at some poor wretch in his death-struggles." 

" Then isn't that a proof that some persons do 
find pleasure in other peoj^le's pain?" modestly 
inquired the little fellow. 

*' Xo, lad," cried the uncle ; " it is not, and can 
not possibly be a proof of what, in the very nature 
of things, I repeat, is a moral impossibility ; for I 
say again, the contemplation of pain in another — 
when we have a sense of the pain — has been made 
to produce an emotion of pity, which is merely re- 
flected suifering, and therefore can not be pleas- 
ure. But it is a proof that humankind may see 
pain loithoiit feeling it ; and it is simply because 
the wantonly cruel do not feel, and have no sense 
of the sufierings they inflict, that they find dehght 
in witnessing the writhings of the death-throes of 
their fellows. Besides, such people are barbarous- 
ly curious, Ben, to see how the sentient creature 
w^ill behave under the trying circumstances ; and 
hence, as with the boys in the fable, even the death 
of another being becomes sport to them, owing to 
the novelty and extravagance of the contortions 
induced by the bodily agony." 

"Oh, I see," the boy exclaimed; "it is merely 
unfeeling curiosity, then, that makes boys and oth- 
ers so cruel as they are.'- 

"Yes, Ben, it is the prurience — the itch of mor- 
bid, unfeeling curiosity, as you say," added the tu- 
tor ; " and directly we begin to think and feel at 
the foot of the gallows, why, we get sick, and 
swoon with a sense of the agony we are contem- 
j)lating." 

" I see ! I see !" said the lad, thoughtfully, for he 
was only too glad to be beaten on such a subject. 

" Well, but, though we do not like pain for 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAET. 491 

pain's sake," Uncle Ben went on, "nor love it 
with the same disinterested love as we do good- 
ness, nevertheless there are certainly times when 
the infliction of pain upon a human being, or even 
an animal, becomes an intense delight to our soul. 
' Revenge is sweet,' says the proverb ; but, though 
it assuredly is sweet at the moment of gratifica- 
tion — most sweet to the savage, unthinking na- 
ture to give wound for wound, and even a hund- 
red heavy wounds for one little one, nevertheless 
ungratified revenge is by no means sweet, but 
simply the bitterest and most galling passion — 
the ugliest and sharpest stinging of all the appe- 
tites that can stir our nature. The hunger for 
blood and human agony is the acutest form of all 
hunger that man can possibly sufler ; and the 
wretch who suifers it feels all the torments of the 
starving man upon a raft at sea, racked with a 
million fold the agonies of starvation. Hence, lad, 
beware how you hug the viper to your bosom ; 
for, rely upon it, in seeking to compass the misery 
of another, you compass your own to a far greater 
degree than you can ever hope to wreak it upon 
your enemy, si^" a the revengeful man suflers all 
the protracted agony of an enduring devilish tem- 
per, that is forever rankling (as if he had a thorn 
in his heart) with all the long-continued gnawing 
of an ugly fester, whereas the object of the pas- 
sion can only be made to feel the mere spasm of 
the temporary wound the other hopes and longs 
to inflict upon him." 

•' Well, then, uncle, revenge," the pupil chimed 
in, " revenge is not sweet ; it is silly." 

" Silly as madness, child," was the answer ; " so 
cut it out of your heart, Ben, while your heart is 
young and generous, and keep your eyes forever 
fixed upon the true nobility of the New Com- 
mandment, which enjoins us to ' love our enemies.' 



492 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

Love them, I say to you, for your own sake — for 
the very happiness there is in loving any one. It 
may be hard work for poor human nature to com- 
pass, and require the highest human heroism to 
be able, even in our mortal agony, to cry, ' Father, 
forgive them, they know not what they do ;' but 
it is possible to grow such a s^^irit of w^ise kind- 
ness in our heart, that if we can not forget a 
wrong, we shall, at least, have common worldly 
prudence enough to forgive it. Nor can I leave 
this part of my subject, boy, without here enforc- 
ing upon you what has always appeared to me 
one of the strongest proofs of the divine origin 
of this same ISTew Commandment itself It is 
merely hmiian to desire blood for blood; this is 
only the bright-red glaring justice of man in the 
rough, and therefore to love the blood-shedder is 
not human ; it is more than human, and is so ut- 
terly out of the natural course and current of our 
feelings and thoughts, that no mere man could 
ever have conceived the wondrous wisdom and 
godliness there is in the precept ; and certainly 
no mere man could have given us in his life so 
lucid an example of the beauty and magnanimity 
of the creed ; no ordinary bit of humanity could 
have done this any more than he could have con- 
ceived and compassed creation. I say, the very 
thought itself is beyond the bounds of human 
imagination and human aspiration to come at ; for 
if it be impossible^ as all allow, for the fancy of 
man to conceive a new sense — another sense su- 
peradded to our faculties that is not a compound 
of two or more of our existing senses, then as as- 
suredly no mere man's brain and heart could ever 
have had an inkling of this supremely new sense 
— this most unnatural impulse to turn the other 
cheek when one has been smitten, and to bless 
them that persecute you," 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 493 

" I understand you, uncle," answered the lad, 
" and thank you kindly for the thought." 

" Well, Ben, I hate chattermg religion even to 
you, boy," the godfather proceeded. "It is a 
thing for the heart to feel, and not for the brain 
to talk about ; indeed, it is the natural communi- 
cation between man and God, and not between 
man and man, who can have no possible tHght to 
interfere in such matters," said the old Puritan, 
with no little emphasis on the word. " But this 
is not religion, lad ; it is philosophy — philosophy 
counseling the heart, and not bigotry striving to 
proselytize it." 

" But, uncle, do you know, I've been thinking 
all this while," confided the simple little pupil, 
" why, if revenge is so wrong and so natural, that 
it wanted Christ himself to come and teach us the 
New Commandment, why such a-feeling should 
have been given to us at all ?" 

"Ah! lad, that ^ohy is always a puzzler; your 
final causes, as they are called, are difficult things 
for poor finite reason to come at," sighed Uncle 
Benjamin. "A mere solitary brick can never 
give us an idea of the architecture of the entire 
palace. Nevertheless, Ben, we can get just a 
twinkle of light sometimes, and so it is with our 
malevolent feelings, which are far from being so 
utterly bad as you imagine. Indeed, if man had 
not been made to grow angry and savage at any 
interference with the objects of his desires, he 
would have been but a poor sluggish brute, and 
certainly would never have wrought a tithe of 
the grand achievements he has in the world. We 
are angry even with the stocks and stones in na- 
ture, Ben, when they offend us, either by injuring 
or impeding us. A baby delights to beat the 
chair or table that has hurt it, and even a great 
man glories in crushing the obstacles that cumber 



494 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

the road to some graud end. This conquest of 
difficulties is, as I before said, one of man's finest 
trimnphs, and if we were not angry with the 
mountains that oppose our progress, we should 
never cut through them ; if the fetters did not 
gall our flesh, we should remain willing slaves all 
our lives. Hannibal's proudest feat was to force 
his way across the Alps rather than to slink round 
the base of them, and he must have felt a finer 
triumph in vanquishing the very mountains than 
he ever did in battling with any human host. So 
our old friend Columbus, too, when he beheld the 
morning sun crimsoning the shores he had been 
so long in quest of, must have gloried more in 
having conquered the sea itself than in having 
mastered his mutinous crew, and humbled the 
pride of the kings who had treated his scheme 
with scorn. We like to crush under our heel the 
stones that are the stumbling-blocks in our way ; 
and it is only when we have so little sense of hu- 
man error and human misery that we treat men 
as stones, and consequently wish to destroy or 
bruise the hearts of our fellow-creatures, that the 
malevolent sjDirit runs riot, and converts a princi- 
ple that Avas meant to stir us to do the grandest 
work into a bit of devilry compassing the bloodi- 
est ends." 

"Isn't it strange," little Ben exclaimed, "that 
the same feeling" should be both good and bad! 
for, if I understand you, uncle, it is only wrong to 
feel angry toward men ; but when we are roused 
with a desire to beat down some great difficulty, 
there is no harm in the feeling." 

" Ay, my boy, it is the difierence between use 
and abuse. The destructive propensity of our 
nature may lead to murder ; it should lead to the 
grandest engineering in life — the cutting through 
the mountains of circumstances that appear to 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 495 

wall in our existence. Nor is the malevolent or 
angry feeling always bad, even when exercised 
against our fellow-creatures, Ben. Maudlin be- 
nevolence is the very dotage of weak and fatuous 
humanity. Some people have such mere milksop 
hearts that they can not bear to punish. But 
punishment, Ben, is simply moral surgery, and the 
rod is as necessary as the knife — not the knife of 
the butcher nor the rod of the tyrant, but each 
used with all the tenderness of a kind and loving 
hand. To cuddle and caress the criminal, lad, is 
to behave as if we were in love with criminality ; 
but to treat a criminal as he should be treated is 
to inflict upon him some bodily penance that will 
have the effect of developing the natural remorse 
and contrition of his heart — to do this with no re- 
vengeful spirit, but with the merciful regard of 
chastening rather than chastising him ; but still, 
never to forget that penance is necessary for pen- 
itence, and that penitence alone can turn and 
soften the heart. Hence, I say, as little punish- 
ment as possible, but still penance sufficient to 
awaken penitence, and, depend upon it, we are the 
criminal's best friend after all." 

The subject was exhausted, and the uncle came 
and stood by the boy at the table, watching the 
progress of his sketch ; and when he had put in 
a few touches for the lad, and shown him how to 
whisk out the high lights with the corner of his 
handkerchief, he began striding the room again 
as he resumed the thread of his theme. 

" The next unselfish emotion that we have to 
treat of, lad," he went on talking and walking, "is 
that of emulation, or the pleasui^e toe derive from 
excelling or sicrpassing others. Ambition, I have 
before told you, is the love of power, or rather 
the love of the deference and court that is paid to 
power — tyranny being the mere love of the pow- 



496 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

er itself. But emulation or rivalry is simply the 
love of racing upon the great human race-course 
of life ; and there are social jockeys who find in- 
tense delight in being ' up in the stirrup,' as it is 
called, and in whipping and si3urring the beast 
they are mounted upon, in the hot struggle to 
win some paltry prize by a neck. Xow jockeys, 
lad, are proverbial for their love of jockeying, 
and a fierce spirit of rivalry is not the temper that 
prompts the soul to acts of the purest honesty 
or the brightest generosity. Moreover, there is 
always this bitter drawback, even to the greatest 
good luck, when one man gambles against anoth- 
er — that the winner makes a beggar of his antag- 
onist ; and even so the delight of distancing oth- 
ers is but sorry child's j^lay, and leads to a whole 
host of heartburnings and feuds among those 
w^ho are left behind, and that only for the glory 
of the one greedy and overreaching nature that 
wins. It is this petty racing spirit that sets ev- 
ery one struggling nowadays to get out of their 
own sphere and class. The servant longs to 
leave ofl" her caps, and go up and sit in the par- 
lor like her mistress ; and the mistress longs, in 
her turn, to be out riding in her carriage like ' my 
lady.' There is no such thing as contentment; 
all is scramble, struggle, greed, and rivalry. And 
yet, exalt the servant into the mistress, and the 
mistress into ' my lady,' and see how the parvenue 
is laughed at and des^Dised ; for the bird which 
has escaped from its cage is almost sure to be 
pecked to death by the old wild ones. Howev- 
er, lad, when the love of excelhng is limited to 
the love of excellence, it is one of the grandest 
pleasures of which our nature is susceptible ; and 
this, when combined with the power to excel, is 
simply human genius ; for this love of excellence 
is not the desire to distance men, but merely to 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 40T 

surpass certain works — to transcend certain beau- 
ties. There is none of the chafing of vulgar, 
worldly competition in it, but it is merely a crav- 
ing to approximate perfection. Indeed, in its 
highest and purest form, it has no sense of man- 
kind — no sense of opposing interest, nor desire to 
trip others up by the heels, but only a sense of 
the work itself, and to make it better than what 
has been done before. It is this feeling which is 
the cause of all human improvement, as well as of 
all human excellence itself. 

" There is now but one other feeling to be de- 
scribed," added the old man, " and then we shall 
have exhausted this division of the unselfish emo- 
tions of man." 

" What is that, uncle ?" the boy inquired. 

'''•The love of conquering others,'''' was the an- 
swer ; " thou^i I have before spoken of this so 
fully, while treating of the love of success and the 
love of power, that only a few words need be said 
farther upon the matter. The love of conquering 
is really the love of humbling the proud, for there 
is little pleasure in depressing those who are al- 
ready depressed. The higher the enemy we van- 
quish, the greater the dehght of the victory. Now 
it was this love of humbling that made the warri- 
ors of old find such pleasure in enslaving the con- 
quered ; and ready as the world always has been 
to worship the conqueror, still the worship has 
been that of awe rather than veneration — the sac- 
rifice paid to the bloodstained pagan idol in the 
hope of appeasing his love of slaughter. Hence 
you see, lad, the delight of triumphing over our 
fellows consists of the composite charm of enslav- 
ing others and elevating ourselves — of putting 
our heel on the neck of one who was once as 
proud as we, and feeling ourselves a few inches 
higher because we are lifted up on the poor ped- 
1 1 



498 YOUNG BENJA:^^N FKANKLIN. 

estal of another's carcass. This is but petty pos- 
ture-master work at best, Ben, and there is too ht- 
tle real elevation and too much human debasement 
about it, too many victims and only one victor, to 
please me. Nevertheless, when the same passion 
is applied to the conquest of the great host of cir- 
cumstances with which we have always to battle 
— to the beating down of difficulties, and to the 
enslaving of the giant forces of the world in which 
we live, and making them work for the benefit of 
mankind, I know no ovation that can be too grand 
for such a bloodless and yet glorious victory." 

THE UNSELFISH EMOTIONS 

Which arise when others are affected in ajyartic- 
ular manner^ hut not hy ourselves. 

" Let me see," said little Ben, " jvhat have you 
got to do now? We have done the unselfish 
emotions which — are — which — how did you ex- 
press it, uncle ?" 

" The unselfish emotions that spring up in the 
bosom when we ourselves aftect others in a par- 
ticular manner," the old man prompted the boy, 
" and now we have to do those which arise when 
others are aflected in a particular manner, but not 
by ourselves." 

"Oh yes," repeated Ben, "when others are af- 
fected by ourselves, and when others are affect- 
ed, but not by ourselves. I think, uncle, you said 
sympathy belonged to the latter class." 

The elder Benjamin returned no direct answer 
to the question, but merely said, "Why do we 
turn sick at the sight of blood, Ben ?" 

The boy stared as if he wondered what that 
could have to do with the subject, and replied, 
"I'm sure I can't say, uncle." 

" Well, lad, in itself," went on the old man, 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 499 

"there is nothing particularly repulsive about the 
vital fluid ; indeed, the color is so intense, the 
crimson so fine, that naturally it should be a pleas- 
ing object to look upon. An infant would dabble 
in it Avith delight ; and yet the sight of it often 
makes stout-hearted men swoon." 

The boy still stared with wonder at what it all 
meant. 

" Why, Ben, as the blaze of that old smith's 
forge is winsome, with the snow lying thick upon 
the ground, because of the imaginary sense of 
warmth it gives us amid all the cold, so blood is 
sickening to us because the imagination has a 
sense of the wound which caused it to flow, and 
of the suflering and danger connected with the 
spilling of it. It is this working of the imagina- 
tion that lies at the very bottom of our feeling of 
sympathy." 

" Oh, I see," young Benjamin murmured out. 

" Had we been made as unsympathetic and un- 
imaginative as leeches, the sight of the vital fluid 
would have delighted us as much as them," the 
teacher proceeded ; " and it is because some peo- 
ple have more or less imagination than others that 
they have more or less pity for the afllicted. This 
is the reason why spectacles of human agony, that 
stir some to their heart's core, can be witnessed 
by others without even a qualm, and why sur- 
geons cease after a time to be unmanned, as it is 
called, during their operations, because, after con- 
siderable practice, the surgical mind becomes too 
intent upon the cure to think any longer of the 
suflering ; so that, you see, the feeling of sympa- 
thy has no more selfishness about it than there is 
selfishness in being pleased with the sight of a 
clean white garment in summer, and which is 
pleasing to us simply because it revives in our 
mind a sense of the coolness of snow." 



500 YOUNG BENJAMIN FeInKLIN. 

" Of course there isn't !" cried the little fellow. 
" I can see it now quite plainly." 

" Now, Ben, this feeling of sympathy springs 
out of the very constitution of the human mind, 
having its source in what is called the association 
of ideas, and thus it becomes a thorough funda- 
mental element of our nature, so that we can not 
but regard it as part of the wise and merciful or- 
dinations of creation that we should suffer with 
the suffering, and rejoice with the joyful. This 
sympathy of ours is the nerve-string that unites 
all the different members of the human family into 
one consentaneous body, with but one common 
heart among all. This is the little cobweb fibre 
that weaves and knits the gossamer threads of 
life into the one perfect social web ; this the won- 
drous cause of the widening circles in the pool, 
making the whole mass pulse and vibrate directly 
one little particle of it is stirred ; for if the whole 
human fraternity were bound together, each to 
each, with a band of living flesh stretching from 
bosom to bosom, and quickened with the same 
blood and reticulated with the same nerves. So 
that, though there were many bodies, there was 
but one common sensorium, one common life 
among the whole, man could not be more surely 
bound to man than he is by the ligaments and 
tissues, as it were, of his sympathetic emotions. 
True, we do not see the si^iritual band, we only 
feel it ; but assuredly it exists as much as if we 
could j)ress the warm life-bond in our hands. All 
that is wanted is that we should thhik when mis- 
ery is presented to us, and then we must feel ; the 
thoughtless alone can be indifferent. It is impos- 
sible that even the meanest and the vilest should 
suffer, and we not feel a pity for their sufferings, 
if we will but let the common course of our intel- 
lectual nature work as it was meant to do ; and 



A PEEP INTO THE HEAET. 501 

it is only the fool that suffers misery to endure 
without feeling it, or without a wish, if not an en- 
deavor, to relieve it." 

" How beautifully it is all arranged, to be sure, 
uncle," was all the little fellow had to say. 

"Beautiful!" echoed Uncle Ben; "why, the 
heavens themselves are not more beautiful than 
is the heart of man, if we will but look into it, as 
closely as star-gazers love to scan the glories of 
the firmament. And see here, lad," he went on : 
" there is the same mighty principle of harmony 
running through the human heart as there is in 
the great womb of space itself. What is it that 
keeps the planets forever circling in their course ? 
Kewton has given us the golden key to the mys- 
tery. There are two forces ever at work, he 
shows us, throughout all nature; the one a mere 
impetus, driving the orbs in the direction of the 
force that has been originally impressed upon 
them, and limited to the mere moving body itself, 
and the other a mighty spirit of attraction, ex- 
tending throughout the entire universe, and tend- 
ing to draw every body each toward the other ; 
hence one power tends to drive the moving body 
in a straight line, and the other to draw it down 
toward the centre of the entire world-system 
itself, so that by the two acting at right angles 
to one another, a balance is produced, and a series 
of movements in diagonals is the result, ending 
in the describing of one continuous and perfect 
circle. Fling a stone straight along in the air, 
and you will find it describe a curve, Ben — a curve 
that is brought to an abrupt termination only by 
the ground on which it fell. It flies in a straight 
line from your hand, lad ; the earth draws it down 
and down to^ the ground ; and so it goes sweeping 
on, falling and falling as it rushes through the air, 
and describing the same ever-bending line as even 
a planet itself in its course." 



502 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

"But what has this to do with sympathy?" 
said the boy. 

" Listen, Ben," the old man added ; " there are 
the same rectangular forces forever at work in 
the moral Avorld as in the stellar one. The selfish 
force drives man away from home in quest of the 
objects of his wants and desires : his ajDpetites 
and his impulses are the impetus which stirs him 
in this direction, and which keeps him forever 
moving in his own individual path. But the un- 
selfish force of sympathy, the mighty and invisi- 
ble power of human attraction, which causes every 
human heart to tend and gravitate, as it were, to 
every other human heart, and which reaches to 
the farthermost corners of the earth, makes him 
revert to the centre of the social circle in which 
he dwells ; and thus the two moral j^owers, work- 
ing in miison, cause him to move harmoniously in 
the orbit that has been marked out for him, so 
that, while seeking his own good, he is forever 
fulfilling his loving offices as well as the duties of 
kinship, friendship, or citizenship to those about 
him." 

" Oh, wonderful ! most wonderful !" exclaimed 
the youth, who was now able to see and compre- 
hend Avhat was meant by the emotion of sym- 
pathy. 

" And now, Ben, let me beg of you, lad, ever to 
bear in mind," the earnest old man concluded, 
" that you have been so constituted that a fellow- 
creature's misery not only should never be a mat- 
ter of indifference to you, but (if you will only 
think as a man — if you will but attend to the 
misery, and not avert your eyes and heart from it) 
you have been made so that it can not possibly be 
indifferent to you ; for as it has been aj-ranged that 
the infection of one happy, smihng face should 
make others feel disposed to smile too, so, lad, the 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 503 

sight of a sorrowing countenance is like the sight 
of blood to unhardened natures : it makes the 
heart sick with the fellow-sorrow it breeds with- 
in it. Still this sickness, boy, is no morbid dis- 
ease, but merely the sickness of the yearning ap- 
petite of our common humanity to heal the ugly 
mental sore — to pour oil into the wound that it 
pains us to look upon. It only wants a halfpen- 
nyworth of oil in the palm, I told you before, Ben, 
for a man to be able to play the good Samaritan 
any day ; and, depend upon it, charity lies not in 
munificence of gifts (which are often only the 
mere lacker of brazen ostentation), but in tender- 
ness of heart, in mercifulness of thought, in kindli- 
ness of construction, and in willingness to serve 
and tend rather than in readiness to give and de- 
part. To the suffering, sympathy alone is all- 
sufficient ; one tear-drop is of more value to the 
honest aching heart than a guinea at any time. 
It is only the born beggars and canting impostors 
that put a market-price upon human commisera- 
tion. A few minutes by the sick-bed, a single up- 
ward glance of the eyes, one tender tone, a gen- 
tle pressure of the palm, are worth more to the 
suffering poor than a whole volume of stock sen- 
timent, a purseful of gold, or a prayer-book full 
of mere magpie religion. The kindly look and 
the comforting word we can always give; and 
these, depend upon it, are the true oil of good 
Samaritanship — the oil that is a very balm to the 
heart-sore ; these the widow's mites that all can 
drop into the poor-box, and which are greater in 
value than all other gifts that can be cast into 
the human treasury. If it were not thus, what 
significance could there be in the proverb which 
says, 'What would the poor do without the poor?' 
for the poor have only the comfort of commisera- 
tion to give to the poor, and this, which trans- 



504 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKXIN. 

cends all, they certainly give beyond all. The 
easy goodness of a 'subscription' sums up the 
charity of the rich ; nights of long watching, days 
of tender nursing, neglect of work, loan of bed- 
ding and clothing, and a hundred other precious 
little bounties, make up, on the other hand, the 
untrumpeted mmiificence of those who have noth- 
ing to give." 

" What would the poor do without the poor ?" 
repeated young Ben, half sorrowfully, to himself. 

" And now, lad, remember, I say again," Uncle 
Ben added, " poverty and suffering ' ye shall ever 
have with you ;' so do you have always a sense 
that three fourths of the human race are born to 
want and hardship ; do you have a sense, in the 
midst of the misery that encompasses you like 
the very air you breathe, that the poor are God's 
own poor — that the bitter heritage is theirs for 
some inscrutable purj^ose ; and do you have still 
a sense that, if you can give no worldly gift, at 
least you have it ever in your power to give the 
infinitely higher one of the SAveet comfort of com- 
miseration, and that you are a better and more 
hopeful man if you cast but a wish that it were 
otherwise mto the treasury." 

" I will have this sense, uncle," the earnest-na- 
tured boy cried out; "for, now that you have 
given it me, it shall never die in me, depend ui3on 
it." 

"That's hard and hazardous to promise, Ben," 
added the other; "the cold shade of worldly pride 
can soon numb it, and make the fine nerve as 
callous as the veins in marble. Beware of worldly 
success, lad, for this, in most cases, is moral failure. 
It wants but little dignity of soul to fail well, for 
sorrow and trouble generally chasten the heart, 
so as to enable even a small man to play the 
martyr in a small way ; but to succeed grandly is 



A PEEP INTO THE HEART. 505 

the most trying thing even to a hero's nature. 
The little ant-hill on which we have raised our- 
selves looks so like a mountain under the micro- 
scope of our ow^n vanity, and we are so prone to 
believe that the vantage-ground has been built 
up by our own spade and shovel rather than by 
the million little busy things forever laboring 
around us — so ready to look at these little labor- 
ers through the wrong end of the telescope, and 
see them infinitely smaller than they are — so quick 
to believe that the old friends whom we have out- 
jockeyed in the world's race have but sorry hacks 
to carry them — so proud to stick the trumpery 
' plate' we have w^on in the ' heat' upon our own 
sideboard, and flash it in the eyes of the vulgar — 
and so credulous to believe, with the mythologists 
of old, that it's only the really great men that are 
raised to the glory of the ' stars,' and to find our 
gods merely in the stellar w^orld of humanity — we 
are so disposed to do all this, I say, that it is dif- 
ficult to find the successful man who advances 
through life, like the rower who understands the 
right use of a scull, with his eyes continually fixed 
upon the scenes he has left behind, and his back 
turned, even while he is ever respectful, to all that 
lies ahead of him." 

Uncle Ben's stanch Puritan spirit rang out in 
every word of the speech as he uttered it, and it 
was manifest in the tone and temper with which 
he spoke that the hatred of servility, and the love 
of hearty, but not arrogant independence, was the 
marked characteristic of his nature. 

Presently he wound up with, " There, Ben, we 
have pretty well cropped out our subject, for it 
would be idle, after what I have said to you about 
the feeling of sympathy, underlying as it does al- 
most the whole of our unselfish emotions, to do 
other than enumerate to you the feelings which 



50G YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

I have grouped under this second division of the 
class. Let me just run over the heads of them, 
and then an end. Thus we find not only a pleas- 
ure in sympathizing with the sufferings of others, 
or rather in reheving or comfortiag the sufferers, 
but also a pleasure in rejoicing at the happiness 
of our fellow-creatures, and this proceeds from 
what is termed the emotion of congratulation ; 
that is to say, of feeling the same gratefulness at 
any good which occurs to others as they them- 
selves do. Then, again, we are capable of finding 
a savage delight in exulting and triumphing over 
the downfall of those we detest, even as we can 
derive pleasure from the worldly success of those 
in whom we feel an interest ; so, too, we can be 
even base enough to feel a charm in gloating over 
the miseries and afflictions of such as we believe 
to be our enemies, and which is, as it were, the 
savage sympathy of malevolence rather than the 
tender pity of the benevolent feelings. These, 
Ben, with the exception of the emotion of envy^ 
or covetous longing, which we feel for those jdos- 
sessions of others to which we fancy we have no 
claim, and that oi jealousy^ or savage greed of 
those possessions to which we fancy we have a 
claim, or to which we asj^ire — these, I beheve, 
make up the whole of the feelings under consid- 
eration, and, so far as I know, exhaust the matter 
of the entire moral emotions — selfish as well as 
unselfish — themselves." 



CHAPTER XXIV. 

THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 

" I SUPPOSE you're going to tell me now, uncle, 
about the prison and the poor-house, and to show 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 50T 

me what are the duties of life, just as you did with 
the amusements, you know ?" observed young 
Benjamin, as he shook the crumbs from the dinner- 
cloth into the fender, and proceeded to fold it. 

" No, I'm not, lad," the elder Benjamin answer- 
ed, stretching his legs, and leaning well back in 
his chair, as if he was settling down for a doze 
rather than a chat. " We're not ready for the 
lesson yet, boy. Before we try to read Greek, we 
must learn the Greek alphabet, and as yet we're 
only half way through the A B C of morality." 

"What! is there more to do about the moral 
pleasures, then, uncle ?" cried the little fellow, 
somewhat disaj^pointed. 

" Yes, more," rejoined the teacher ; " a little 
more schooling of the heart, Ben, and then you 
will be ready to appreciate the moral of the long 
story. Up to this time, lad, we have been dealing 
with the pleasures that arise from the perception 
of some good or evil accruing to ourselves or oth- 
ers. But there is something more than good and 
evil in the moral world : there is the little matter 
of riglit and wrong^ boy, and that is a nut that 
needs good sound teeth to crack, I can tell you. 
Now if I were to ask you, Ben, what is right and 
what is wrong, you'd begin by saying — " 

" Now just let me speak for myself, sir," inter- 
rupted the boy, playfully, as he began to spread 
his sketch and colors before him again ; " let me 
see. Well, I should say it was right to speak the 
truth, and wrong to tell a lie ; that it was wrong 
to steal, and right to give every man his due, as 
father says — and so on, you know." 

" Ay, I knew you would," returned the uncle ; 
" and yet you've told me nothing, you little gos- 
ling, about what is either right or wrong in itself. 
You've only informed me that John is a man, 
when I didn't want to be made acquainted with 



50S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

what kind of an animal John was, but merely with 
what class of creatures a man belonged to. What, 
I say again, is right per se — right in itself — right 
in the abstract, as the schoolmen say ?" 

" Well, I should say that's right which isn't 
wrong, then !" cried the eager lad, endeavoring to 
make something like a guess at the riddle. 

" Yes, but what's wrong ? that which isn't 
right, I suppose you'd say ; and so there we 
should keep shuffling our feet backward and for- 
ward, like soldiers halting on a march, and yet 
never advancing a step ;" and as the old man said 
the words, he shook his head and smiled at the 
innocence of the puzzled youngster. " Well, lad, 
let's give you a helping hand up the ship's side 
before we weigh anchor, and tell you that right is 
literally what is ruled; what is ordained; what 
is straightforward, or done dh^ectly^ m obedience 
to some command." 

" Well, but, uncle," argued the plain-siDoken lit- 
tle fellow, " if you were to tell me to go and steal, 
as I have heard you say the gipsy mother does to 
her child, immediately after it has said its prayers, 
that wouldn't be right for me to do ; and yet, if 
I did so, I should only be acting in obedience to 
a command, as you say." 

" It icould be right, lad — " 

" O — oh, uncle !" cried the boy, breaking into 
the middle of the sentence. 

" Right in an unthinking child, Ben," concluded 
the godfather ; " but you know that the command 
would be at variance with a superior command 
that we are bound to listen to, above all others. 
The subject, therefore, becomes narrowed into, 
what commands are we, like dutiful children, to 
attend to." 

" I know what you mean uncle," said the 
youngster, a little discomfited. 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 509 

*' No you don't, Ben," was tlie rejoinder, " for, 
remember, I'm not talking religion to yoii. I am 
merely endeavoring to help you to spell out the 
laws of the heart, lad — the commands of what is 
called the conscience ; and I want to let you see 
there are natural commandments as well as spir- 
itual ones, and that the ordinations of nature are 
and should be the same law to us as even the law 
of the Bible itself; for law is simply that which 
is laid dovm^ or enjoined for our obedience. The 
laws of what is called nature are but the laws of 
the one great Lawgiver after all, and therefore 
must be one and the same law. The three great 
breaches of the various forms of law in the world 
make the three great human errors. Thus &in is 
what is contrary to divine law, or the breach of 
some religious commandment or ordination of the 
great Ruler of all ; yice what is contrary to some 
moral law, or the breach of some righteous com- 
mandment or ordination of nature ; and Crime^ 
that which is contrary to some social law, or the 
breach of some politic commandment or ordina- 
tion of the rulers of the land." 

" I see ! I see !" again murmured the youth. 

" Now some, I should tell you, in all honesty, 
my little man," the elder Benjamin continued, 
"have gainsaid this doctrine I am propounding 
to you, and have urged that, if right be mere 
obedience to orders, God, if he had so pleased, 
might have ordained a code of laws the very op- 
posite to that of the Ten Commandments, and 
would it then be rights they ask, to plunder and 
slay ? But the simple answer, lad, is ' yes ;' for 
then we should have been so constituted that 
slaughter and pillage would have been the one 
great good to us, even as they are to some war- 
ring nations in Christendom to this day. Never- 
theless, the All-wise and All-merciful ?iever could 



510 YOUNG BENJAMIN FKANKLIN. 

have willed and ordained wrong right, any more 
than he could have willed two and two to be five. 
As it is, however, it has assuredly been made part 
of the wise and merciful ordinations of nature not 
only that we should love the man who does a 
benefit, and does it for the pure sake of benefit- 
ing, but that we should believe that the benefac- 
tor acts rightly in so doing, even as we have been 
made to feel satisfied that the malefactor does 
what is lorongP 

" Yes, uncle, and you are right too," added lit- 
tle Ben ; " right in what you say, and acting right- 
ly in saying it, because I can feel how much it 
benefits me." 

"Well, then, Ben," the other went on, "we now 
see what is right and wrong ; we see that right, 
morally speaking, is merely what is conformable 
to the commands of the conscience, and conscience 
is simply moral consciousness — an intuition which 
springs up within us that certain human conduct 
is contrary to the ordinations of nature immedi- 
ately such conduct comes to be judged by the 
natural instincts of the heart. Moral right, then, 
lad, is that which is agreeable to the decisions of 
the moral judgment, and these decisions of the 
moral judgment are simply what are called senti- 
mentsP 

"Why, I thought, uncle, a sentiment was mere- 
ly an opinion," interposed young Ben. 

" So it is, boy, an opinion begotten by a feel- 
ing," ran the reply, " but it is not a mere judicial 
opinion. I have, for instance, an opinion that it 
will rain to-morrow, and that is simply a purely 
intellectual opinion, because my intellect alone is 
concerned in coming to the decision ; but I have 
an opinion also that vice is hateful, and that is a 
sentiment, because both the intellect and the emo- 
tions are engaged in forming the judgment." 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 511 

" So," said little Ben, " a sentiment is an opin- 
ion begotten by a feeling." 

"Yes, Ben; we speak of sentimental novels, 
and a mother's sentiments about her child, and so 
forth, meaning thereby neither passion, emotion, 
nor temper, but merely the opinions engendered 
by such emotions and tempers," explained the 
tutor. "And now, having pointed out to you 
the pleasures of the emotions themselves, I shall 
proceed at once to show you what are the delights 
of the sentiments, though even before doing this 
I should say a few words to you on the world of 
opinion in which we live; for the moral senti- 
ments are divisible into three classes, like the 
emotions from which they spring, and may be de- 
scribed as, (1.) Sentiments engendered in us by 
our opinion of ourselves ; (2.) Sentiments engen- 
dered in us by our opinion of others ; and, (3.) 
Sentiments engendered in us by others' opinion 
of us. Hence you perceive how much of human 
happiness depends upon mere opinion, and that 
we live in a world not only of sensation, thought, 
and emotion, but of oxjinion also." 

" So we do," chimed in the boy ; " and yet I've 
heard people say they don't care about mere opin- 
ions, and father, I know, objects to sentiment." 

" Your father objects, Ben, as wise men do," 
urged the elder Benjamin, " to that affectation of 
feeling which merely chatters sentiment — that is 
to say, which delivers the opinions of the emo- 
tions, without having any corresponding emotions 
to justify them." 

THE WOELD OP OPINION. 

" Now this world of opinion, my son, is as mar- 
velous as the solid external world, or the fairy- 
like internal ideal world in which we pass our 
lives. It is this which makes the Tomkinses live 



512 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

in continual terror of the Jenkinses ; this wiiich 
makes people clothe themselves in the most un- 
seemly costumes at most unseasonable periods ; 
it is for this that people furnish their houses ; for 
this they wear their jewels ; for this they exhibit 
their plate, and dress their lackeys up like ma- 
caws ; and for this they keep their carriages : for 
all is done, not to please themselves, not to minis- 
ter to their own comforts, nor to add to their own 
happiness, but merely to please their neighbors ; 
and yet not to please them either, as true kind- 
ness loves to please others for the mere pleasure 
it finds in pleasing, but to please them as actors 
strive to please, for the hollow vanity of the mere 
clapping of the hands they get from the specta- 
tors. And when we think that if there were only 
the same pains taken to benefit others as there is 
to i^lease them, with the view of extorting the 
small encouragement of a pat on the back from 
the beholders, how difierent a world it might be ! 
why, then we can hardly help believing that the 
love of applause has turned this same world of 
ours into a playhouse, where scenery and decora- 
tions, dress and mimicry, are the chief attractions 
of the time. Again, lad, it is for this mere opin- 
ion of people, the majority of whom can never be 
known or seen, or even heard of, that the author 
writes, the poet weaves liis verses, the artist paints 
his pictures, and the warrior risks his life, even as 
it is this same public opinion that the truly right- 
eous man gives no heed to, and the martyr braves. 
Again, Ben, look at the tyranny of fashion, which 
is only public opinion expressed on the small mat- 
ter of dress. Why, if Xero had passed an edict 
condemning women to compress their ribs, for 
the greater part of their lives, in an iron-bound 
corselet, think how historians would have raved 
about the devilry of the ingenious inhumanity; 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 513 

and yet, if one fashionable fool thinks it the per- 
fection of human beauty to cut her body into two 
compartments like a wasp, and to make them 
seem as if united by a mere ligature of a waist, 
instantly the whole legion of fashionable fools 
voluntarily condemn themselves to the same tor- 
ture. One idiot, again, parts his hair down the 
middle, and then immediately every other idiot 
in the world falls to halving his locks in the same 
manner ; one monkey trims his whiskers this way, 
and instantly the whole cageful of monkeys coax 
theirs into the same contortions ; one thinks it the 
acme of elegance to wear his hands in his breeches 
pockets, and the next day nobody can keep their 
fingers out of the sides of their small-clothes. 
Surely, Ben, that little extra spoonful of brains 
which man has had given to him, to make him 
something more than an ape, has been wasted 
upon the majority of skulls ; for, as we laugh at 
the ortolan, that is fattened by being made to feed 
six times a day, by means of half a dozen sham 
sunrises per diem in the shape of a lantern thrust 
every four hours in at a hole into a darkened 
chamber, so these people of fashion are as silly as 
the poor deliciously-fat birds, ever mistakiug the 
light of a farthing rush-light for that of the true 
glory of the day, and tricked, by their love of pal- 
try splendor, into the exaggeration of their bulk, 
only to tickle the taste of the voluptuary." 

He paused for a moment or tAvo, and then add- 
ed, " Nevertheless, Ben, this same world of opin- 
ion can work its marvels as well as its follies. It 
was this that snatched Martin Luther from the 
stake, and this that drove the bigoted James from 
the English throne ; it is this, too, that keeps so- 
ciety in check far better than any statute-book 
could ever accomplish. Farther, it is merely the 
still small voice Avithin us — the outspeaking of the 
K K 



514 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

heart itself — that makes the murderer's sleepless- 
ness so terrible to him ; and it is this small voice 
again that makes the martyr find a consolation 
even in the flames." 

" Why, it seems, uncle, as if there were two 
sides to every one of our feelings," advanced the 
youngster ; " for no sooner do you show me that 
what you called ma-ma-malevolence is bad, than 
you begin to let me see how good it can be, Avhen 
properly used, to overcome the difiiculties that 
plague us." 

" Yes, Ben," rejoined the uncle, " as even benev- 
olence itself may run into maudlin dotage." 

SENTIMENTS ENGENT»EEED IN US BY CUE OWN 
OPINION OF OUESELVES. 

" Now, my patient little listener, we will begin 
with the consideration of the first class of the 
moral sentiments, and what did I tell you they 
were, Ben ?" 

" Here it is, uncle," cried the eager boy, for he 
had jotted it down again upon the paper before 
him ; " sentiments engendered in us hy our oicn 
ojnnion of ourselves.'''' 

" Just so, Ben," nodded Uncle Benjamin ; " en- 
gendered^ mark! for there is always a certain 
amount of moral criticism, of pondering over and 
scrutinizing our own conduct, lyreceding the de- 
velopment of the sentiment in our bosoms ; and 
then, according as we get to think well or meanly 
of ourselves, according as we pluck up our shirt 
collars, and smile blandly at the image of ourself 
in the ideal looking-glass, or according as we 
shake our head and scowl at the reflection, so 
does the opinion that we form of ourselves blend 
with a certain affection of our nature, and become 
a sentiment of either self-approhation or disapp'o- 
hation^ as the case may be. Nor does the process 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 515 

end here ; for this senthnent of approbation or 
disapprobation unites again with the natural hk- 
ings and dislikings of our natures, and develops, 
in its turn, an emotion of some form of lasting- 
love or hate for our own self, and thus we get to 
feel some one of those delicate shades and grada- 
tions of the affectionate emotions that I before 
showed you make up the chromati(i|Bcale of love; 
the result of the entire mental process being the 
development of a feeling of self-respect, self-regard, 
self-esteem, self-admiration, or self-honor, even up 
to that form of self-worship and self-glorification 
which comes of self-veneration." 

" Oh !" exclaimed the little fellow, delighted to 
be brought back again to the chain of love, " how 
plain and easy it seems to come, uncle !" 

"Ay, boy, it is easy to put the puzzle map to- 
gether when you are well u]d in the geography 
of the countries it relates to, but it is no child's 
play, I can tell you, to make the map itself. It 
requires many long voyages of discovery, and 
many observations to be taken, before the longi- 
tude and latitude, and the bearings of the difier- 
ent points of the human mind and heart can be 
settled, and before the thoughts and feelings can 
be traced down as plainly as the land itself upon 
a chart for our guidance. But oh ! these tropes 
and figures, Ben, they are the true flowers of 
speech, that always lead us children out of the 
hard, dry, dusty road before us. Now, of all the 
difi*erent forms of self-love, my boy," he proceed- 
ed, " the only one that a truly wise and great man 
can ever allow himself to be seduced into by the 
witchery of his own conceit is the one at the very 
bottom of the scale, viz., self -respect^ and which is 
only just one rung of the ladder above utter in- 
difterence. The rest, lad, are all personal vanity 
and coxcombry ; for your fool has ever the crest 



516 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

of the coxcomb for bis coat of arms. We might 
as well be down on om- spiritual knees, worship- 
ing the mud idol of our own selves, after we have 
tricked the dirty deity out in all the tinsel and 
trumpery jewelry of man's vanity — as well do this 
as be forever playing the ' fon,' like the spoony 
boy Narcissus, and making sheep's-eyes at our 
own florid pifetrait, as imaged in the shallow ba- 
sin of the fountain of our own conceit. Dej^end 
U2)on it, lad, a man that knows himself thoroughly 
knows that there is no beauty in him when he 
comes to be turned inside out, for then there is 
such a hideous display of stomach and bile that 
the human anatomy is by no means pleasant to 
behold. To see our own fetch at any time, Ben, 
should set the mind thinking how we should look 
in the felon's dock at that great time when there 
is to be no sj)ecial pleading, but all are to be 
judged as they really are and might have been. 
The felon's dock, boy, tries the handsomest coun- 
tenance ; and rely on it that many of those that 
seem to have angel's faces now will look hardly a 
whit better or fairer than felons under the search- 
ing glance of the Great Judge's scrutiny. 

" I do not wish to knock all the self-love out of 
you, my little man," he added, "but I say, never 
let your self-regard go beyond the bounds of self- 
respect, even if you can honestly mount so high. 
And beware of self-admiration and self-adulation 
as you would wish to ward off madness and do- 
tage. I do not wish to teach you that you are a 
born devil, my dear boy, for little children have 
been said by Him who knew them best to be as 
pure as the kingdom of heaven ; but the misfor- 
tune is, the mirror grows tarnished by age, and 
soon ceases to reflect the light of the skies. I do 
not want you to believe there is no hope for you, 
for I tell you, lad, that you are ever hopeful, and 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 517 

that you can never be so utterly good, nor so ut- 
terly bad either, that there may not be hope of 
you still. Think of what you are, and forever con- 
trast the image with what you might be. Have 
faith in the possible goodness of your own nature, 
even while you have a consciousness of the 2^osi- 
tive shortcomings — the meanness and baseness of 
it ; have ever before you a pattern self for your- 
self to copy, and be forever comparing your own 
self with your own model nature. Let the moral 
looking-glass reflect both back and front : look 
back, and have a sense of what a shapeless, soul- 
less, bodily lump you are ; and then look front- 
ward, and see God's image stamped upon your 
features ; and after all, shake hands with your- 
self, and pledge your honor to yourself that you 
will still strive and struggle to be the fine, up- 
right, and fair-faced fellow you mai/ be, and not 
the cringing and limjDing moral hunchback which 
honest retrospection shows you are. Therefore,! 
say again to you, Ben, be ever self-respectful ; lift 
your hat and bow your head to your own supe- 
rior nature — that nature which is, and always 
should be in advance of you ; but never be self- 
enamored, and rather pass by your other self with- 
out so much as an aj)proving nod, and hang your 
head in very shame at the shabbiness of the con- 
temptible scoundrel directly you are alive to the 
dirtiness of your friend. Self -respect and self- 
/cw'^A, Ben, these are the only self-sentiments that 
can be honestly encouraged or even countenanced 
in the heart of man ; with the exception, indeed, 
of what is termed self-approbation — but certain- 
tainly not self-satisfaction — at our own conduct." 

" You may depend on my minding w^hat you 
say, uncle," the pupil assured the teacher. 

" This sentiment of self-approbation, on the con- 
trary," the other went on, " is the immediate re- 



518 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIX. 

suit of the operations of the conscience or moral 
judgment, for right and wrong are but the true 
and the false of the heart ; and the same faculty 
which compares, weighs, deliberates, and determ- 
ines upon the rectitude or error of intellectual 
propositions, also comes to the decisions upon 
the propriety or impropriety of human conduct. 
Hence the feeling of approbation that ensues in 
the mind directly we have an intuitive perception 
that such an act is right^is tantamount to the feel- 
ing of conviction which follows immediately Ave 
have an intuition that a certain statement is true; 
and this explains why the morals of nations dif- 
fer, in the same manner as different countries have 
different kinds of truths, and even different tastes, 
and tJiat with one and the same nerves, brain, and 
heart. For as it is oiot true that there is no such 
thing as truth, so it is not right for skeptics to as- 
sert that there is no such thing as rectitude in the 
world ; since in the same manner as it is demon- 
strable from the very nature of the forms of things 
that all the angles of a triangle onust be equal to 
two right angles, so is it morally certain, from the 
very constitution of our innate sympathies and 
antipathies, that it is impossible the benefactor 
could ever be disapproved of for benefiting oth- 
ers, for the pure sake of the benefit conferred, es- 
pecially when it is felt that he has violated no su- 
perior claim in so doing." 

" So, then, it is as plain to see what is right and 
wrong, as it is to tell what is true and false," mur- 
mured the younger Benjamin, still pondering on 
the problem. 

"As plain when the matter is self-evident," was 
the rej^ly, " and yet as difficult when the relations 
are involved. ' Which was first,' says Plutarch, 
' the bird or the Qgg ?' — who can riddle the truth 
out of that vexed question ? So, in like manner, 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 519 

we may ask, wbicli is first, country or child ? Bru- 
tus preferred his country ; should he have prefer- 
red his child?" 

The boy was about to take up the gauntlet, 
and have a tilt with the old man in favor of " the 
child," but the uncle cut him short by crying, 
" To the point, boy ! to the point ! Now this feel- 
ing of self-approbation is the all-sufiicient reward 
that good and great men work for. It is only 
the little moral fop that wants and craves for the 
approbation of others. Indeed, according as a 
man loves the applause of his own heart or that 
of others, so are we enabled to gauge the great- 
ness or littleness of his soul. The moral hero 
listens only to the voice within him, for this he 
knows is but the echo of the divine decrees — the 
whispering of an angel's tongue prompting him 
to the right course — the trumpet of the unseen 
herald proclaiming the law of nature to him, and 
crying ' le roi le veutf and so the cheering of his 
own heart is like the music of the spheres to his 
conscience — a soft mellifluent concord flowing out 
of the very harmony of things. But as for the 
applause of others, what is it but the poor actor's 
reward? And he who acts his part well — who 
mimics the man of probity, honor, and loving- 
kindness to the life — who can play the fine walk- 
ing gentleman with propriety in front of the foot- 
lights, even though he be the dirtiest and shabbi- 
est of varlets when unseen of men, is sure to get 
a round or two for the clap-trap moral sentiment 
that he invariably utters as he quits the scene. 
Be assured, lad, there are two standards of right 
and wrong, of dignity and villainy — an external 
and an internal one ; and that the man who con- 
forms to the goodness of men is the petty moral 
coxcomb, tricked in all the canting fashion of the 
time — the vagabond waif and stray that always 



520 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

goes with the current, and ready even for canni- 
bahsm, if human haunches came to be thought as 
thoroughly in good taste as those of venison; 
while the man who studies only the goodness of 
his own heart, and squares his conduct with his 
conscience, has all the sturdy, stalwart element of 
the honest old martyr in his bosom — of the faith- 
ful servant who likes always to have his orders 
direct from his master." 

"I can understand now, uncle, what is meant by 
listening to the voice of one's own conscience," 
the godson observed, " and shall strive to have 
always an easy one myself; and I know mother 
has often told me how people suffer from remorse 
after a wicked act, and that it is only their own 
guilty conscience, as she says, upbraiding them 
for their wickedness." 

" And that brings me, lad, to the last part of 
our present theme," the godfather added, " name- 
ly, to the varied feelings of pleasure or pain which 
are developed in the bosom directly we come to 
reflect upon our own conduct, and to approve or 
disapprove of what we have done. Some time 
ago I told you that many of the emotions sub- 
sided into a subdued and more or less j^ermanent 
form of pain or pleasure, Avhich are called ' tem- 
pers ;' and so with the sentiments, Ben : many of 
them have a tendency to develop a vivid feeling, 
which has all the character of an emotion ; but 
with this simple distinction, that there is always a 
sense of right and wrong, approbation and disap- 
probation, connected with it, rather than merely 
good and evil. Such states of mind may be called 
tnoods^ for they have also many of the character- 
istics of temper. Of these moods, the feeHngs of 
self-complacency and remorse may be cited as in- 
stances, proceeding as they do from certain senti- 
ments which are engendered by our own oj^inion 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 521 

of ourselves ; so anger and gratitude are the moods 
of raind begotten by the sentiments engendered 
by our opinion of others' conduct toward us, and 
thus we come to speak of an angry mood and a 
remorsefid mood^ even as there is again the proud 
mood^ or the humble mood of mind, which arises 
whenever we compare our conduct, our gifts, or 
our possessions with those of others, and think 
ourselves the better or worse for them than they. 
The delight of the feeling of self-complace7icy 
which springs up within us whenever we review 
our past conduct, and feel that we have ^dolated 
no tie of kindred, broken no law of nature in our 
acts, but that we have fulfilled some little of the 
duty that was imposed upon us when we were 
ordained to form part of the great human chain, 
each link forever helping and being helped on by 
the rest through life — this is the exquisite conso- 
lation of an easy conscience, which all allow to be 
the very summum honum of existence — that fine 
foretaste of heavenly enjoyment which follows 
the consciousness of having done one good act — ■ 
of having foregone some little pleasure, suffered 
some little misery for the sake of another's hap- 
piness — of having rendered back some fraction of 
those gifts which we hold on trust for the good 
of our fellows. This is given us as the liberal and 
honestly-earned wages of good work in this world, 
whereas the applause of men is but the petty prize 
held out as a bribe for sorry workmen to try and 
work better. To strive to win the applause of 
our neighbors, however, for the mere sake of the 
trumpery vanity of the cheering voices, without 
doing the good for which alone the applause is 
honestly due, is to endeavor to trick the pay- 
masters into paying the wages without doing the 
work at all. This is the true cheatery and infamy 
of modern society — the obtaining of moral credit 



522 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

under false pretenses — the moral swindling that 
is daily practiced by high and low, rich and poor, 
gentleman and sweep. Nevertheless, though we 
may cheat others, lad, we can not well trick our- 
selves. We know our ingrained meanness, even 
though a hundred charity-dinners toast and hnzza 
at our magnanimity ; and even if the trickster be 
caught in his own trap, and be himself tricked by 
the speciousness of the hollow plaudits into the 
conceit that he is a bright grain of the salt of the 
earth, assuredly the time will come when the de- 
lirium of the fever shall pass away, and the soul 
shall be roused by an angel's trumpet out of the 
long trance that has been on it, and see itself as in 
a black mirror, without a speck of color to give a 
meretricious tone to the hard hues and ugly forms 
of the picture." 

Young Ben stopped painting as his imcle halt- 
ed a minute on coming to a resting-place in his 
discourse ; but the little fellow merely looked up 
to assure the old man that he was still ready for 
his words. 

" Remorse, Ben, I should tell you, is not a nec- 
essary and immediate consequence of iniquity. 
A dog has no conscience, lad, and a man may live 
the life of a dog ; be as savage and remorseless 
as a blood-hound, or as pampered and inoffensive 
as a lapdog, and yet be as unabashed as the mas- 
tiff or the poodle after all. To develop conscience, 
calm and patient reflection is requisite; and if 
there be neither time nor humor for this, of course 
the great judging principle can never pass sen- 
tence, since the culprit has escaped trial. ISTever- 
theless, if we be really something more than dogs 
— if we have a principle of volition within us — a 
principle that transcends organism, since its office 
is to be ever at war with the mere organic in- 
stincts of our nature, and if the dumb beasts have 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 523 

only these same organic instincts to guide them, 
surely we do not die the death of dogs ; and then, 
how shall oftended justice be filched of its due? 
Remorse may not come for a time ; it may re- 
main as dead in us as the faculty of perceiving 
light and color did in the born-blind boy till he 
was couched by Cheselden ; but lohen we see — 
when the nine days' puppyhood of human life 
has passed away, and our eyes are fairly opened, 
and we come to behold ourselves as we really are, 
why then remorse shall burst upon the head like 
a storm, as assuredly as the thunder after exces- 
sive heat." 

SENTIMENTS ENGENDEEED BY OUE OPINION OF 
OTHEES. 

"We now come to the sentiments engendered 
by our opinion of others^ don't we, uncle ?" asked 
little Ben, as he turned to his paper, and refreshed 
his memory with the notes he had made. 

/'Yes, my patient little philosopher," answered 
the uncle, who was not a little astonished at the 
boy's continuity of attention, " and the pleasure 
we derive from such sentiments consists chiefly 
in the delight we find in loving and being grate- 
ful to others, as well as in approving and in think- 
ing well of them ; while, on the contrary, human 
nature is capable of finding a savage enjoyment 
in detracting from the merits of others — in cen- 
suring and satirizing them, as well as in venting 
our anger or indignation upon those who have 
either ofiended ourselves personally, or commit- 
ted some flagrant injustice against our friends or 
neighbors ; for indignation is but sympathetic an- 
ger, the sense which makes us feel a wrong done 
to another, the same as if it had been done to us. 
And here I should point out to you what is the 
peculiar characteristic of this class of sentiments, 



524 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

namely, its tendency to inspire lis witli trust in 
those about us ; for if we live in a world of opin- 
ion, lad, at least we live in a world of faith to 
give us confidence in the general j^robity of our 
fellows. Faith, Ben, is usually supposed to apj^ly 
to religious matters, and to be that principle of 
our soul which transcends reason as a means of 
developing belief. For mstance, we can not ra- 
tionally understand the infinitude of space, and 
yet we have a faith that the universe is endless, 
and feel morally certain that there can not possi- 
bly be any limit or boundary to it, since if there 
be a wall round it, as you would say, boy, what 
is on the other side of the wall ?" 

"Ah! that's what I never could make out," 
the little fellow observed, ready to fly ofl" into the 
new mystery. But the godfather was too intent 
upon the work he had in hand to be drawn aside 
from his object ; so he merely said, " ISTo, nor the 
greatest philosoj^her either. However, Ben, faith 
is as necessary for worldly guidance as it is for 
transcendental knowledge itself; and our daily 
life is one continuous round of credence. Indeed, 
if it were not for the credulous principle within us, 
we should grow up as ignorant and barbarous as 
savages. You believe the world to be a huge 
ball, Ben, but you believe this only because peo- 
ple tell you so, and despite the testimony of your 
own eyes, which assure you that it is merely an 
enormous plate of land and water. You believe 
that there are shores across the sea, even though 
you see none, and see, too, that the water itself 
ends at the horizon ; and you beheve this simply 
because your father and I tell you that w^e came 
thence ; and yet, when poor Columbus reasoned 
with the bigoted potentates of Spain and Portu- 
gal, they laughed such notions to scorn, and pre- 
ferred the avouchment of their own eyesight to 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 525 

the demonstrations of his logic. You believe the 
million strange tales of history, and yet you could 
never have known one fact recorded there of your 
own cognizance, nor have even so much as set 
eyes upon the old chroniclers, nor, indeed, have 
ever spoken with any one who did. When, too, 
you come to study the discoveries and elabora- 
tions of physical science, you will find how heavily 
your faith has to be taxed, and that if you pause 
to test and prove for yourself each new truth as 
it startles your mind, you will find that you will 
advance no quicker than the tame elephant, which 
dreads a pitfall at every step, and will not move 
a foot till it has tried with its trunk the solidity 
of each paving-stone it has to pass over. Indeed, 
lad, we are born credulous, even to superstition, 
and credulous we must be to the last, if we would 
hold the least communion with our fellows ; for it 
is only the silliness of skepticism that would have 
us believe all men liars till we have proved them 
truthful, even as it is the roguery of lawyers to 
make us think all men are rogues till we find them 
honest. Why, lad, if it were not for the abiding 
trust of faith, how could we have any sense of the 
future ? But as it is, the child lays its little head 
on the pillow, and gives itself up to the tempo- 
rary death of sleep, confident in the new life of 
to-morrow. The philosopher and the boor see 
the gunpowder explode once, and instantly the 
boor and the philosopher too have faith that the 
wondrous powder will, under the same circum- 
stances, continue exploding forever after. The 
farmer sows his grain in perfect faith that season 
will follow season as before, and husbands the 
crop in perfect faith that year will succeed year 
to the end of time. The swain writes to his ab- 
sent lover in faith — in faith that the letter will 
reach the girl, even though it have to travel thou- 



526 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

sands of miles before it gets to her hand — faith 
that the magic little ink-marks he traces on the 
paper before him will whisper in her ear the very- 
words he wishes, and pour his heart out to her as 
he is then doing ; ay, and in faith, too, that she 
will kiss the letter as he kisses it, and that their 
lips will thus be joined again, even though miles 
of space lie between them. And farther, to round 
the perfect circle of our faithful lives, the gray- 
beard lays his head upon the pillow like the tired 
child, and gives himself up to the temporary sleep 
of death, confident in the new life of to-morrow." 

" Oh, isn't it pretty !" the little fellow ex- 
claimed. 

" Pretty^ child !" echoed Uncle Ben ; " it is sim- 
ply true, and truth is always more or less beautiful. 
Indeed, Ben, doubt and mistrust enter the mind 
only through the hard lessons of experience. We 
have an innate tendency to believe — to believe in 
nature, and believe in man too ; even as all men 
have an innate propensity for truth-speaking and 
frankness, and this has to be checked and pervert- 
ed before they can lie and deceive ; for the truth 
ever rises first to the lips, and falsity and secrecy 
are merely the dishonest after -thoughts of the 
craven heart. Now it is this sense of the sjDon- 
taneous truthfulness of human nature that gives 
rise to that spirit of trust in our fellow-creatures 
which is* one of the grandest and kindliest char- 
acters of our soul. Again I say to you, boy, let 
your ear be ever stone-deaf to the base attorney- 
precept w^hich would have you believe all men 
rogues till you find them honest ; for, rest as- 
sured, trust between man and man is as necessary 
for the business and friendship of the world, as 
even faith in the uniformity of nature is for our 
continued physical existence. The entire machin- 
ery of commerce is trust and credit; and even 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 527 

in what are called ready-money transactions, the 
same principles must have sway for a time ; for 
either the seller must part with his goods, or the 
buyer with his money, one before the other, un- 
less they stand, the one holding and the other 
grasping the wares, while each does the same with 
the gold and silver, both relaxing their grip of 
their former possessions only ^t one and the same 
time. But when you come to look into the won- 
drous mechanism of the world's merchantry, lad, 
and see the all-pervading element of trustfulness 
which permeates the monetary affairs of all great 
nations, you will find how ship-loads of treasure 
are consigned to utter strangers in remote coun- 
tries without deed or document from those to 
whom they are intrusted ; how dealings are daily 
made for thousands, and often millions, by mere 
word of mouth, without a line to vouch the bar- 
gain ; how a man's mere signature will pass cur- 
rent in the market as the representative of a mass 
of gold that no cart could carry ; and how a sim- 
ple slip of printed tissue-paper will go from hand 
to hand, and be changed for an infinity of goods, 
and yet none care to carry it to the bank, and get 
the gold for it that it is believed to be convertible 
into." 

" I declare, uncle," interrupted the boy, " all 
this seems more wonderful to me than any thing 
you have yet told me." 

"Indeed, my lad, be assured that untrustfulness 
is the enormity^ and not the rule of human life 
and conduct (otherwise the world could not go 
on as it does) ; be assured, too, that the attorney- 
creed is the simple consequence of lawyers having 
to deal with the exceptional cases of breach of 
faith in society rather than being witness to the 
innumerable daily instances of the faithfulness and 
ordinary integrity of merchant life. For it is self- 



528 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

evident that if, year after year, the bad debts in 
trade in the least exceeded the good ones, com- 
merce itself must collapse after a time, and ev- 
ery atom of capital ultimately disappear from the 
land ; while, on the contrary, the growing riches 
of a country are ever a golden proof not only that 
the principle of faith in nature has made men la- 
bor and husband still as before, but that the prin- 
ciple of trust in man has not been abused, and that 
more have turned out trustworthy than roguish." 

" Indeed — indeed, uncle," the little fellow cried 
out, " this is the most cheerful view of human na- 
ture that you have yet given me." 

" It is, my lad," responded the mentor ; " and 
all the world is cheerful, if we will look at it with 
but just a glimmer of daylight about it. And now, 
Ben, I come to you yourself," the old man said, 
solemnly ; " you see what a grand and noble prin- 
ciple is this propensity to trust in man, so do you 
never do a thing to abuse it. Remember, the man 
who trusts and believes you honors you ; he pays 
you the finest and most elegant tacit comj^liment 
it is possible for one man to pay another. Let the 
truth, then, be ever on your lips, like the light of 
the morning sun, gilding the crimson edges of the 
clouds, and spit the rising lie from your teeth be- 
fore your coward heart has time to shape it into 
words. Do yoit ever bear in mind that man's in- 
nate belief in the truthfulness of his fellow-man is 
so fine and generous a gift that it has all the im- 
press of the godhead's own righteousness upon it. 
Do you then ever see it as a sacred thing, and re- 
gard lies and equivocations as the very blasphemy 
of honor. Remember, too, you damage not only 
your own integrity by falsity, but you undermine 
a man's trustfulness, and so make him doubt and 
suspect others." 

The boy again began to scribble round the 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 529 

drawing; and when he had finished, the uncle 
once more proceeded with the exhortation. 

*' Be just and righteous to the man, too, who 
makes you his trustee, no matter upon how small 
a business. Break faith with none ; for remem- 
ber, the one who trusts you is himself trusted by 
others, and if you fail to keep your bond with him, 
you make it hard for him to meet his engagements 
with those to whom he himself stands pledged. 
Commerce, Ben, is the broad arch overspanning 
every city and country, with nothing but the 
honor of meil for the keystone to bind the whole 
together, and with each atom of the structure 
bearing upon, and not only sustained by, but sus- 
taining the others. Moreover, I say, be not only 
strictly just, but have you ever the generosity to 
he fair in all your dealings. Justice is but nega- 
tive virtue, doing no man wrong; but I say to 
you, be more than negatively virtuous ; be 2')osi- 
tively righteous enough to be hberal rather than 
mean and grasping in your transactions, and pre- 
fer to give an advantage to the man with whom 
you deal instead of taking advantage of him ; so, 
when the scales of equity are trembling with the 
exactness of the equipoise, do you be the one to 
throw in the market handful that shall change the 
rigid straitness and squareness of the arrangement 
into the grace of the well-turned balance." 

Again the lad fell to scribbling the moral mem- 
oranda on the margin of the paper before him, 
and when he had finished he looked up as usual 
in the old man's face, and said, " Yes, uncle, I am 
listening." 

" Moreover, Ben," then went on the good coun- 
selor, " as you wish to be trusted yourself, and 
feel how galling it is to be doubted and suspected, 
be it your rule ever to put your trust in others, 
and let not the exceptional rogues and cheats of 
L L 



530 YOUXG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

the world ever beat out of you your faith in the 
general trustworthiness of your fellows. A bum- 
bailiff believes every man to be a swindler ; but 
do you have a soul above the catchpoll's, and 
think well and kindly of men, as you yourself 
would be well and kindly thought of. Remember 
how difficult it is in the tangled yarn of human 
motives to pick out the very ' cue to action,' and 
that the parsimony, which is wise husbandry in 
a prudent man, is but base avarice in the miser ; 
the punishment, which is kindly chastenment from 
the hands of the wise governor, is simply bloody 
malevolence when the blow is jn-ompted by re- 
venge. Be yoit^ therefore, the one ever to trans- 
late the passages in a man's life freely rather than 
crabbedly, and to choose the finer spiritual render- 
ing in preference to the harsh hteral construc- 
tion of the act. Be slow to susj^ect, for an eager- 
ness to beheve in meanness is but the mean 
prompting of a mean nature ; and have faith in 
no man's baseness till the creed is fairly forced 
upon you ; but lohen you find your old friend out, 
why, then fling the dog from you as you would 
a fawning hound with dirty paws. Moreover, I 
say to you, trust even the untrustworthy, so long 
as they remain true to yourself; for if one breach 
of faith Avith another is to put an end to all faith 
in us, how can the fallen ever hope to rise ? Be 
assured, too, that by trusting those who have 
broken trust, the chances are you so rouse in 
them the dormant sense of honor, that even tliey 
will scorn to abuse the generosity that gave them 
credit for a virtue which others supposed to be 
dead in them. Therefore, I tell you, lad, lend 
your money, as I have done, to the starving thief, 
in the face of the whole world, and let the A\^hole 
world see that even he^ if you pique his honor, 
can render you every farthing of your due. To 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 531 

give others credit for being as honorable as your- 
self till you find them dishonorable is not only to 
be a gentleman, but to create gentlemen. It is to 
raise men to a dignity that the monarch himself 
can not confer ; for, though a king may make a 
man a lord, he can not make a man a gentleman, 
for that is the Almighty's own peerage, over which 
none can take precedence." 

More notes were made, and there was the same 
silence as before during the pause, for little Ben 
could do no more than listen, record, and ponder. 
The theme, he well knew, was far beyond his 
powers to grapple with ; so, like a wise little fel- 
low as he was, he became a good listener instead 
of being only an indifferent talker. 

" And now, my son," presently resumed Uncle 
Ben, " there remains but the small matter of pride 
and humility to glance at, and then our task is 
done." 

The only remark the boy hazarded was, " You 
said that we felt proud when we compared our 
conduct, our gifts, our possessions, our station in 
life with that of others, and fancied ourselves 
better than they for what we do or have — that's 
what you said, uncle." 

" I know, lad," smiled the godfather ; " pride 
always comes of one of those human comparisons 
that are truly said to be odious. Even when the 
pride is just, we merely put ourselves in the scales 
against a heap of rags and bones, and find a small 
delight in seeing the human refuse kick the beam ; 
but in false j^ride it is a mere bubble that we strive 
to give gravity to. As well might the peacock's 
feather itself be proud that it no longer trails in 
the dirt, as the upstart fool of a mandarin who 
wears it. But to my mind, boy, it is the light 
weights, after all, that win the race, for the hum- 
ble are ever the wise. The humble man flings 



532 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKXIN. 

himself upon his knees, and looks upward, in very- 
worship of the greatness and the goodness he 
loves to coutemj^late ; the proud man, on the oth- 
er hand, draws himself up, and looks down, in 
scorn of the baseness and the littleness he dehghts 
to contrast with himself; the one gets a reflected 
grace from the glory he is forever regarding, the 
other a smudge of the soot from the sweeps with 
whom he is continually measuring lengths. Be- 
sides, pride is merely the coxcomb crest, as I said 
before, of the poor mumming fool in the mask. 
For what has the proudest of us to be proud of? 
Is it your person, man ? why, that is merely the 
showy binding which is ever relied on as a means 
of fudging oflf a trumpery book. Is it your 
clothes ? why, the tailor's dummy might as well 
lord it over the scarecrow. Is it the strawberry- 
leaj^ of your grace ? but what are the mere 
leaves of honor without the fruit? Is it your 
learning? what is it but the chattering of the 
Greek aliDhabet after all? Is it your wisdom? 
what are you, Mr. Philosoj^her, but the monkey 
hammering away to get at the ticking of the 
watch ? Is it your art ? a grasshopper might as 
well be proud of the power in its hinder legs, as 
the artist of his handicraft. Is it your goodness ? 
pshaw ! had you any of the true stuff about you, 
pride could not enter your heart, seeing that you 
are no better than the idiot — the mere creature 
of the great inscrutable will." 

The task was now fairly ended ; for, though 
there were still the feelings of anger and grati- 
tude belonging to the class. Uncle Ben had already 
spoken of these while treating of the affectionate 
emotions, so that he merely pointed out to the 
boy that the grateful impression which preceded 
the feeling of love is more a sense of dehght than 



THE STILL SMALL VOICE. 533 

gratitude, and that the impulse of thankfulness is 
strongly felt only when we are convinced that the 
good done us is a voluntary act of grace conferred 
upon us, and that merely with the view of doing 
us the good. 

The third and last class of sentiments, viz., those 
which are engendered in us by others' opinion of 
ourselves^ the uncle merely particularized, with- 
out entering into the details of each distinct feel- 
ing, saying that the pleasures we derive from this 
group of sentiments consist of the delight we feel 
in being loved by others, or in being cidm.ired by 
them, as well as in being pitied^ respected^ honor- 
ed^ revered^ and approved by them ; while, on the 
other hand, he said it was possible, under certain 
conditions of mind, for man to find a perverse en- 
joyment in being hated^ despised^ contem7ied^ and 
even p>erseciited by his fellows. Indeed, after all 
he had propounded about the love of approba- 
tion, which he told the boy was the one feeling 
imderlying almost the whole of the class, it was 
idle for him to expand the subject into tedious- 
ness. 

So he concluded by simply informing his little 
godson that the love of the approbation of others 
is the main element in what is called vanity^ even 
as the love of our own approbation is the ruling 
principle in what is termed pride. Farther, he 
said that the reason why praise is so agreeable to 
weak natures is because it serves to increase peo- 
ple's faith in their own powers, and this is neces- 
sary for their very existence ; so that where this 
self-faith is the feeblest (because the powers are 
felt to be the weakest), the desire for praise and 
admiration is always found to be the strongest. 
Hence the love of approbation, he added, is the 
distinctive mark of modesty and diffidence, and is 
as pardonable, and even beautiful to behold, when 



534 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

not made an all-absorbing passion, in the feminine 
character, as it is a sign of effeminacy and foppery 
in the masculine mind. 



CHAPTER XXy. 

THE BURDEN OF THE SONG. 



Uncle Ben's evening meal did not take long 
to discuss. The bowl of milk was soon emptied, 
and the hot, buttered corn-cake that Dame Frank- 
lin had sent up with it was rapidly made away 
with, for the old man was anxious to get the les- 
son ended that night. So, when the boy had re- 
moved the basins, and swept the crumbs from the 
table, another log was thrown across the dogs on 
the hearth, and the Httle room made to flicker 
again with the ruddy flames in the dusk of the 
" 'tween-lights." 

The old man drew his chair round close to the 
fire, and sat watching the burning fagots as he 
proceeded to put the finishing touch to the view 
of life he had sketched out for his little pupil. 

Little Ben placed himself on the hassock at his 
uncle's feet, and said, as he laid the old man's 
veiny hand in his own little palm, and kept try- 
ing to smooth the wrinkles out of the back of it, 
"I know what you're going to tell me now, unky, 
dear. You're going to point out to me what is 
my duty to those poor boys we saw in the poor- 
house and the jail ; ain't you, now ?" 

The godfather shook his head, and replied, 
" Not so, my boy ; they are only a mere fraction 
of the mass to whom we owe a duty. I might, 
had I cared to harass your little soul into good- 
ness, have taken you to the mad-house, and shown 
you the host of pauper lunatics and idiots there ; 



THE BURDEN OF THE SONG. 535 

or I might have led you to the quarter of the town 
where the bhnd beggars mostly live, and have let 
you see them with their blind wives (for the blind 
mostly marry the blind), sitting in their clean and 
tidy homes, without a candle, in the dark, and 
have let you hear them tell their blind dreams and 
stories of the death of the faithful dogs that they 
still love well enough to weep over. I might have 
shown you how even they, beggars as they are, 
seldom or never shut the door against the beg- 
gar who is worse oif than themselves ; and how, 
though they have hearts full of pity for suffering, 
they are still callous enough to relish, with all a 
true beggar's zest, any roguish cheat of mendi- 
cancy. I could have taken you likewise, lad, to 
the crippled and the maimed, and have brought 
you face to face with the half-beggar hucksters 
of the town, that pretend to sell some petty wares 
about the city so as to avoid the imprisonment of 
the jail as regular mendicants on the one hand, or 
of the poor-house as indoors people on the other. 
I might have shown you, too, the petty markets 
frequented by the very old and very young for 
trades that require but a few halfpence as capital 
to start in ; I might have let you see these poor, 
struggling, half-starved things, shivering at early 
morning in their rags, and might have let you 
hear how even they — merchants who are literally 
not worth twopence — are trusted, ay, and seldom 
or never break faith with their creditors either. 
And when you had read the sorry leaf out of life's 
book from beginning to end, I might have whis- 
pered in your ear, Ben, that these were not the 
voluntary beggars of the world — not the profes- 
sional mendicant cheats that prefer lying and lout- 
ing to honest labor — but God Almighty's own 
beggars— the blind, the crippled, and the infirm." 
" I wish you had taken me to see all this, un- 



536 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

cle," broke in the little fellow, as he still fondled 
with the old man's hand. 

" Nevertheless, Ben, this is not the rule of 
want," went on the other; "it is good to know 
that such misery exists about us, so that we may 
have a sense of the favors vouchsafed to ourselves, 
even if we have no desire to relieve the suffering. 
But there is little good in the knowledge as a 
matter of wisdom, for the study of exceptional 
cases gives the mind but a sorry understanding 
after all. What I do want to wake you up to, 
however, is the laio of himian suffering^ lad, and 
the reason why I took you to the poor-house and 
the jail was merely to shake you well, and rouse 
you to listen to the tale I had to tell." 

" The law of human suffering !" echoed the boy. 

" Yes, the law !" reiterated the teacher, " for it 
is the rule of life that more are born to want and 
suffer than to feast and be merry, Ben." 

*' Well, but, uncle," remonstrated the little fel- 
low, " I'm sure I don't see so many poor peojDle 
about as you'd make out." 

" How should you, lad, when the truly honest 
and deserving poor are always the secret suffer- 
ers, and not the ostentatious beggars that love to 
parade the afflictions on which they trade ?" was 
the gentle rebuke. " Besides, you are born in the 
sphere of comparative comfort and competence, 
Ben ; and such is the caste of class-life among us, 
that the people belonging to one division of soci- 
ety have no more knowledge of the people in an- 
other grade, even though they live continually 
about them, than they have of the inhabitants of 
the remotest countries. Hence the well-to-do, 
having no communion with the hard-to-do, are 
naturally skeptical when they are told that their 
happiness and ease is the anomaly in life, and that 
suffering and trouble are the normal lot of hu- 



THE BUEDEN OF THE SONG. 637 

manity. Now look here, little man : in every 
state, as nearly as possible two thirds of the pop- 
ulation are born to a life of hard labor, and live 
continually, as it is called, ' from hand to mouth ;' 
so that, as almost all trades have their brisk and 
their slack seasons, and many a calling depends 
on the very elements themselves for the pursuit 
of it, you can readily understand that the mass of 
the people must have regularly-recurring periods 
of bitter privation to pass through every year of 
their lives. Think, for one moment, of the im- 
mense host of stomachs that depend on the very 
soil itself for their bread — the multitudinous body 
of ground-laborers (including the great agricul- 
tural troop), and the miners, road-makers, and ex- 
cavators, that are more or less required in all na- 
tions. Think, too, of the immense army of carri- 
ers, carters and porters, bargemen and boatmen, 
merchant -seamen and dock -laborers, coachmen, 
stablemen, and messengers — why these, lad, gen- 
erally make up two fifths of the entire body of 
grown men in every civilized community, and 
upon the labor and health of these, some thou- 
sands, if not millions of families, are dependent. 
Think then of the brutal ignorance in which this 
tremendous crowd of people are left to wallow 
generation after generation, and next think of 
their comfortless homes and their aching limbs 
after a heavy day's labor (you have never done 
one yet, my boy), and then you will be able to 
make some allowance for the attraction they find 
in the stimulus and cheering fire and company of 
the tap-room. And when you have made this al- 
lowance, and seen that thrift and providence, un- 
der such circumstances, are moral impossibilities, 
you will be able to have some faint idea of what 
kind of a season winter must be to such people, and 
to their wives and children — winter, when there 



53S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

is always less to do and get, and more wanted. 
Why, if we can feel for the birds of the air, and 
the robins, when the snow is on the ground, sure- 
ly the heart can not be utterly steeled against the 
thousands of little half-feathered human birds — 
such as the children of the ground- workers — that 
suffer Avhen the earth is like a block of marble 
with the frost, as much as, if not more than, the 
robins themselves at such times. 

"The skilled laborers again," the imcle resumed, 
" such as the tailors, the shoemakers, the weavers, 
and the vast body of metal-workers, and wood- 
workers, as well as the builders of every com- 
munity, are a multitude that are becoming almost 
as large as the tribe of unskilled workmen them- 
selves, and in many of these trades there are the 
same periodical fluctuations as in those that de« 
pend upon the seasons and the earth for the sub- 
sistence of the people belonging to them. So that 
when I tell you that as many as two thirds of the 
people in most countries are wagemen, living gen- 
erally from hand to mouth, and that a very large 
majority of them are hardly a half-gallon loaf 
beyond starvation, you will understand that I do 
not speak at random, and that icant and suffer- 
ing is the rule oflife^ and comfort and happiness 
only the exceptio^i^^ 

* The numbers and proportions of the different classes of 
society in our own country at the time of taking the last cen- 
sus were as follows : 

Total population of Great Britain in 1851 (in round num- 
bers'), twenty-one millions. 

But of these not quite half were children and young peo- 
ple under twenty years of age, the majority of whom were 
incapable of earning their own living ; the returns being 
4,765,000 males in Great Britain under twenty years of age 
4,735, 000 females " " " " " 

y, 500, 000 of young people of both sexes. 
While, on the other hand, out of the eleven and a half mil- 



THE BURDEN OP THE SONG. 539 

" Oh, uncle," exclaimed youDg Ben, " how can 
you tell me such things after the fine, pleasant 

lions of grown people, rather more than half were women, 
the majority of whom also were incapable of supporting them- 
selves ; the returns being (in round numbers) 
5,500,000 males in Great Britain above twenty years of age 
6,000,000 females " " " " 

11,500,000 of grown people of both sexes. 

So that out of a gross population of just upon twenty-one 
millions, but little more than a quarter, or five and a half 
millions, were grown men, upon whom the support of the 
other three fourths of the community more or less depended. 

Now these five and a half millions of grown men through- 
out Great Britain were thus distributed as to their occupa-, 
tions : 

In the first place, there was upward of one million of agri- 
cultural laborers, shepherds, drovers, farm-servants, wood- 
men, and men employed about gardens, and the like. 

And besides these there was xipward of a quarter of a 
million of general laborers, such as ground-workers, navi- 
gators, railway laborers, roadmen, coal-heavers, and so forth. 

Then there was more than a quarter of a million of miners 
and quarrymen, and upward of another quarter of a million 
of cai-riers and carters, railway-men and omnibus-drivers, 
coachmen, grooms, and stable-men, boatmen and bargemen, 
canal service-men and merchant-seamen, messengers and 
porters, warehousemen and packers, and others engaged in 
the conveyance of goods or persons from one part of the 
country to another. 

Hence there was an aggregate of very nearly two millions 
(one million nine hundred and fifty thousand) of unskilled 
laborers among the five and a half millions of men through- 
out Great Britain ; or, in other words, more than a third of 
the grown male population of the country existed in the semi- 
brute state of mere "hewers of wood and drawers of water." 

The remaining three and a half millions of men in Great 
Britain were thus occupied. First, there were more than 
two millions of artisans, or skilled laborers, following callings 
that required more or less of an apprenticeship before they 
could be profitably pursued, and these were made up of 
more than a quarter of a million of builders (such as brick- 
layers, slaters, masons and plasterers, etc.) ; upward of a 
third of a million of wood-workers (such as carpenters and 
joiners, cabinet-makers, and carvers and gilders, musical in- 
strument-makers, chair and box makers, turners, frame- 



540 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

views of the world you have given me ? But why 
should all this want and suffering be, if God is as 
good and kind as you say He is ?" 

makers, block and print cutters, clog-makers, coopers, ship- 
wrights, coach-makers, wheelwrights, sawyers, basket-mak- 
ers, lath-makers, cork-cutters, etc.); upward of another third 
of a million of textile manufacturers (including the cotton- 
factoiT workers, and the several working manufacturers of 
woolen cloths, worsted and stuff materials, caipets, silk and 
ribbon, flax and linen, fustian, rope, sail-cloth and lace, as 
well as the printers and dyers of calico) ; and one hundred 
and twenty-five thousand workers on textile materials (such 
as the great body of tailors, umbrella-makers, hatters, etc.) ; 
upward of a quarter of a million, too, of leather-workers 
(such as curriers and tanners, saddlers, and whip and har- 
ness makers, glovers and shoe-makers) ; more than a third of 
a million metal-workers (such as iron manufacturers, black- 
smiths, locksmiths, gunsmiths, farriers, anchor-smiths, boiler- 
makers, file-cutters, nail-makers, needle-makers, engine and 
machine makers, tool-makers, mill-wrights, implement-mak- 
ers, wire - workers, braziers, button - makers, coppersmiths, 
whitesmiths, tinmen, zinc-workers, platers, goldsmiths and 
silversmiths, watch-makei's and philosophical instrument- 
makers) ; nearly one hundred thousand workers in clay, 
stone, and glass (such as the brick - makers, potters, and 
earthen-ware manufacturers, pipe-makers, and glass manu- 
facturers). Nearly nineteen thousand workers in bone and 
hair (such as the comb-makers, brush and broom makers, 
horse - hair - workers, and hair- dressers, and wig -makers); 
twenty-five thousand and odd printers and paper-workers 
(such as compositors, pressmen, paper-stainers, bookbinders, 
and paper-hangers) ; nearly fifty thousand chemical manu- 
facturers (such as the manufacturers of acids, artificial ma- 
nures, cements, ink, colors, disinfectants, varnishes, medi- 
cines, etc., as well as the dyers and fullers, soap-boilers 
and tallow-chandlers, provision curers, French polishers, gas 
manufacturers, paper - makers, patent firewood and lucifer 
match manufacturers, fire-work makers, etc.) ; besides, there 
were upward of two hundred thousand of workers at provi- 
sions (such as bakers, confectioners, and millers, butchers, 
maltsters and brewers, fishermen, and even milkmen). Then 
add to these ten thousand general mechanics (branch not 
mentioned), and we shall have an aggregate of two millions 
and sixty odd thousand of skilled workmen above twenty 
years of age in Great Britain. Moreover, there were up- 



THE BUEDEN OF THE SONG. 541 

*' Why should hunger, which is one of the chief 
evils of a life of poverty, be a pain, lad ?" was the 

ward of one hundred thousand clerks and officials through- 
out the country (including government clerks, law clerks, 
commercial clerks, parish clerks, as well as the toll collect- 
ors, and commercial travelers, besides the various parish and 
church officers, and those attached to the diiferent charitable 
institutions and law courts) ; there were also nearly another 
hundred thousand gentlemen's servants, and nearly the same 
number (ninety-two thousand) of guardians of the public 
peace (such as policemen, soldiers and pensioners, sailors in 
the navy, and marines) ; and, lastly, there were nearly twen- 
ty thousand itinerant traders (such as showmen, and men 
with games and sports, hawkers and peddlers), together with 
not quite forty thousand males above twenty years of age 
belonging to the helpless and dependent class (such as pau- 
pers, vagrants, alms-people, beggars, lunatics, and those liv- 
ing on their relatives). 

Now, putting the whole of these several classes of skilled 
and unskilled laborers, clerks and officials, policemen and 
common soldiers and seamen, as well as the servants, itin- 
erant traders, and dependents all together, so as to form one 
body, we have a total of four millions tlaree hundred and 
sixty odd thousand of grown men (with families generally), 
who, if they are not all strictly wagemen, at least mostly live 
like them from hand to mouth upon their immediate earn- 
ings, and whose earnings, moreover, seldom exceed one hund- 
red a year, often fall below fifty, and in a large number of 
cases hardly ever rise above ten shillings per week. Four 
millions three hundred and sixty odd thousand of grown 
men, living more or less from hand to mouth, the majority 
of whom are seldom half a quartern loaf beyond starving, 
and that out of only five and a half millions of grown men 
altogether ! so that if Uncle Ben had said that three fourths 
of the people in most communities are born to want and suf- 
fer, the statement would have been more correct. 

It may be useful to the young reader to know what classes 
constitute the more lucky portion of the community — that 
portion which is either so well paid for the services rendered 
by them as to enable them to live like gentlemen, or who 
are engaged in trade or commerce, or else living on their 
means as independent people. 

Well, imprimis, there are sixty-seven thousand men be- 
longing to what are styled the learned professions: thirty 
thousand clergymen and priests, seventeen thousand lawyers, 



5i2 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

interrogatory in reply. " Why, because, as I told 
you before, if it had been made a pleasure, we 

and twenty thousand doctors. Then there are fourteen thou- 
sand officers belonging to the army, navy, or East India serv- 
ice, on either full or half pay. 

Moreover, there are another sixty-seven, thousand grown 
men belonging to the literary and artistic classes (such as au- 
thors, editors, scientific "professors," teachers, schoolmasters, 
music-masters, and others ; musicians, actors, artists, engra- 
vers, carvers, pattern designers, draughtsmen, medalists and 
die-sinkers, architects, surveyors, and civil engineers). 

Farther, there are upward of a hundred thousand connect- 
ed with the moneyed or capitalist classes, as well as what 
maybe styled the " commission" business of commerce (such 
as those who are returned as independent and annuitants), 
of whom there are about thirty-three thousand in the last 
decennial report, and not quite "twenty thousand landed pro- 
prietors, as well as twelve thousand house proprietors through- 
out Great Britain. Then there are two thousand ship-own- 
ers; not quite two thousand bankers, and nine thousand 
merchants ; besides a host of ship agents, brokers, agents and 
factors, salesmen, auctioneers, accountants, pawnbrokers, gen- 
eral merchants and dealers, as well as coach and cab owners 
— in all, one hundred and fifteen thousand people. 

Next, there are upward of a third of a million farmers and 
graziers throughout the country. 

After these come the tradesmen and dealers, of whom 
there are altogether as many as three hundred and seventy- 
eight thousand, including thirteen thousand general "shop- 
keepers," five thousand and odd cattle and sheep dealers, 
three hundred horse-dealers, twenty odd thousand inn-keep- 
ers, twelve hundred livery-stable-keepers, six thousand board 
and lodging-house keepers, thirty-seven thousand licensed 
victualers and beer-shop-keepers ; nearly nine thousand wine 
and spirit merchants, eight thousand corn-merchants and 
flour-dealers, nearly the same number of green-grocers, three 
thousand cheesemongers, not quite two thousand poulterers, 
and six thousand seven hundred fishmongers ; as many as 
fifty -five thousand five hundred grocers, and three thousand 
tobacconists ; and about twenty-two thousand others dealing 
in vegetable or animal food, or else in drinks and stimulants ; 
fifteen hundred " water providers," the same number of deal- 
ers in salt, and only as many oil and colormen, besides two 
thousand others dealing in oils and gums ; eleven thousand 
and odd druggists, over ten thousand coal-merchants and 



THE BUKDEN OF THE SONG. 543 

should have sat still and should have starved with 
delight. Even so with human misery : if all were 
well-to-do — if there were no sickness and no suf- 
fering in the world, there would be no need of 
sympathy, nothing to be grateful for, no reason 
for human love. If man wanted nothing at the 
hands of his parents or his neighbor, if he were 
able to shift for himself directly he came into ex- 
dealers ; nearly nine thousand dealing in wool, and three 
thousand woolen-drapers ; six thousand clothiers, and three 
thousand hosiers ; nearly twenty-eight thousand linen-dra- 
pers ; about five thousand dealing in silk, as silk-mercers, 
etc., and thirteen thousand others engaged in furnishing ar- 
ticles of dress ; five thousand and odd dealing in hemp, and 
eighteen thousand in flax ; sixteen hundred fellmongers, 
three thousand grease and bone dealers, and only five hund- 
red and sixty dealing in feathers and quills ; three thousand 
five hundred stationers, and two thousand and more dealing 
in paper ; six thousand five hundred publishers and book- 
sellers ; six thousand four hundred people dealing in timber, 
three thousand five hundred in glass and earthen-ware, and 
six hundred in precious stones ; besides whom there are the 
dealers in the different metals, or metal goods, as three hund- 
red and twenty in copper, five thousand in tin, two thousand 
in lead, thirty in zinc, six thousand and more in the mixed 
metals, and about twenty-five thousand in iron and steel, in- 
cluding nearly seven thousand ironmongers. 

Now add to the numbers of the above-mentioned classes 
twenty odd thousand men above twenty years of age return- 
ed as sons and scholars, and nearly fifty-five thousand others 
"of no stated occupation," and we have a gross total of one 
million and eighty-six thousand grown men in positions of 
comparative comfort, against four million three hundred and 
sixty odd thousand in comparative indigence. Or, assuming 
each of these men to be married, and have two children re- 
spectively, we shall, if we multiply these totals by four, come 
to something like an approximate notion as to how many of 
our twenty-one millions of people enjoy lives of ease and 
plenty, and how many live lives of care, if not distress. The 
result shows that the proportions are four millions of well- 
to-do folk and seventeen millions of struggling poor in the 
country. 

A brief summary of the whole is subjoined : 



5U YOUNG BENJAMIN FBANKLES". 

istence as readily as the young grub, why, he 
would have no more love than a grub, no more 

Number of Men above Twenty Years of Age, belonging to the 
Wage Class, and others living from Hand to Mouth in 
Great Britain, calculated from the Census q/'1851. 
Laborers (agricultural and general, as well as"^ 

those engaged in mining and the cari-ying >• 1,944,300 

trades) ) 

Artisans 2,061,400 

Clerks and officials 112,350 

Gentlemen's servants 96,150 

Policemen, and common soldiers, and seamen... 92,000 

Showmen and hucksters 18,300 

Dependents (including paupers, vagrants, alms-) gg ^^^ 

people, beggars, and living on relatives) j ' 

4,362,500 

Number of Men above Twenty Years of Age belonging to the 
Moneyed and Capitalist Classes, as icell as to the Profes- 
sional, Artistic, and Trading Classes in Great Britain, cal- 
culated from the Census o/'1851. 
Military, naval, and East India officers (on full) ^^ qqq 

and half pay) > ' 

Professional men 67,900 

Literary and artistic men 67,000 

Moneyed classes, capitalists, merchants, and) ^^^ gg^ 

commission agents > ' 

Farmers and graziers 367,000 

Tradesmen and dealers 378,710 

Sons and scholars belonging to wealthier classes 21,700 

Of no stated occupation 54,800 

1,086,760 
Total number of males above twenty years of age) ^ ^^g g^^ 

in Great Britain > ' ' 

Total number accounted for in the classes above) ^ ^^^ geo 

given > ' ' 

Unaccounted for 9,555 

It is impossible to give the returns exactly on this subject, 
owing to the confounding of the employers with the employ- 
ed in the last census returns, as well as owing to the dis- 
gi-acefully imbecile manner in whicb the various occupations 
of society are classified in the government report, the logical 
arrangement being such as would shame a school-boy ; for, 



THE BURDEN OF THE SONG. 545 

afFection and gratitude than a house-fly. But as 
it is, this sense of sympathy has been made one of 
the most tender and graceful emotions of our na- 
ture, being a double blessing — blessing him that 
gives, as Shakspeare says, and him that receives 
as well ; and rest assured it was for the develop- 
ment of this, the finest feeling of our soul, that 
some have been born to want and suffering, and 
some, on the other hand, endowed with the pow- 
er to commiserate and relieve." 

on account of an insane attempt at what is styled a "sub- 
jective" classification of the people, we have the woolen and 
silk manufacturers there grouped under the same head as 
the cow-keepers and the fishmongers, the soap-boilers and 
tallow-chandlers, fellmongers and tanners, merely because 
they are all engaged upon animal matters ; so, again, we have 
in the last census report the cabinet-makers and timber-mer- 
chants grouped with the green-grocer and confectioner, and 
the cotton and lace manufacturers lumped with the oil and 
colormen and brewers ; the paper-makers and cork-cutters 
classed wdth the grocers and tobacconists, and all for the ex- 
tremely simple reason that they are eveiy one employed upon 
vegetable matters ; even as the chimney-sweeps go with the 
coal-miners and the glass manufacturers, the coal-heavers 
with the workers in precious stones, the road -laborer with 
the goldsmith and silversmith, and the brickmaker with the 
blacksmith, solely because they are one and all employed 
upon minerals. Then we have the carpenter and joiner class- 
ed with the actor, engraver, and musician; the bricklayer 
and pavior with the civil engineer, under the miscellaneous 
head of those engaged upon art and mechanics ; though the 
turners and block and print cutters are lumped with the ba- 
kers and the brewers under the head vegetable workers, even 
as the carvers and gilders and electro-platers are classified 
with the railway navigators under the mineral order. As 
well might the arrangement have been according to the four 
elements, viz., those with. Jire; those working upon or under 
the earth ; those working with air or gases ; and those w^ork- 
ing with or upon the ivater, as have adopted the childish plan 
of those working with animal matters, vegetable matters, and 
minerals. Indeed, the classification of the people given in 
the last census is the very fatuity of system-mongering, com- 
pared with which the crudity of an alphabetical arrangement 
is the height of enlightenment. 
Mm 



546 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

"I see, now, what it all means, uncle ; and that 
is the reason,! suppose, why we are told that from 
those to whom much is given much is expected." 

" Be it then your aim, lad, to do your duty in 
that state of life in which it has pleased God to 
call you," was the simple reply. 

There was a slight pause, and then the uncle, 
reverting to the starting-point of the long dis- 
course, asked once more the following question : 

"And noio do you know how to spend your 
money when you've got it, Ben ?" 

" Oh yes ; I know what I shall do with mine," 
cried the little fellow, jumping up from his stool 
and shaking his head as he paced the room with 
the excitement of the thought. 

" What ?" quietly inquired his godfather. 

" AYhy, I shall give it all away to the poor," 
was the earnest answer. 

"Trash, Ben! trash! and mere boyish senti- 
ment," rejoined the mentor. "This is the same 
as the old monkish folly — the folly of ascetic big- 
ots, who thought the world a thing to fly from, 
and who gave up their riches to the Church, ay ! 
and made a legion of beggars in return. Now I 
tell you, lad, beware of the cant of charitable 
donations, and rely more on helj^ing, comforting, 
and assuaging than giving. Be assured that you 
do no good in making a beggar of a man, and 
leading him to believe in the chance half-guineas 
got out of charity rather than in the certain week- 
ly income to be gained by industry. Be assured 
that the kindliest act you can do even to a born- 
beggar is oiot to give, but to teach him to be self- 
reliant by developing in him the means to earn. 
So I say to you, give only where it would be a 
mockery to offer to lend, namely, to God's own 
poor — the blind, the crippled, the idiot, and the 
infirm. But with the honest poor, be ever suffi- 



THE BUEDEN OF THE SONG. 547 

ciently respectful of their independence and their 
misery (for suffering should at least meet with this 
from us) to treat them as honest, independent men, 
and aid and assist them in their trouble and want 
with any advance you can ; but remember they 
are not beggars, but workmen, and therefore with- 
hold the beggar's dole. Still, in all you do, lad, 
ever bear in mind that giving is merely charity 
made easy to the rich. It costs so little to give 
and depart, and requires such a deal more self- 
denial to stay and tend, that those who believe 
in the all-sufficient power of money believe also 
in the charity of the pocket rather than the heart. 
But do yoic believe, lad, there is a benevolence be- 
yond gifts — the benevolence of wishing to see the 
needy and the suffering grow thrifty and sober, 
cleanly and courteous; of wishing to see them 
find pleasure in the more graceful and refined en- 
joyments of our nature ; of wishing to see them 
alive to the beauties of the world about them, as 
well as the graces and dignities of life and action ; 
to see them well-housed, and justly dealt by, and 
kindly treated ; and not only does true benevo- 
lence wish to see all this compassed, but it strives 
its best to promote the end. This well-wishing 
and generous-striving are often more genuinely 
charitable than even liberality in giving. Never- 
theless, where there is an urgent necessity for pe- 
cuniary relief, I say to you, let no base love of 
your money stand between you and your duty; 
for if you have been lucky enough to escape the 
common lot of want and pain, you should at least 
be grateful enough for the favor that has been 
shown to you to share a little of the bounty with 
those whom God has left unprovided for, and left 
them unprovided for, too, solely that you and 
they might know the sweet friendship of befriend- 
ment." 



549 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

" But, uncle, why shoulchiH I give all my money 
away to the poor if I please ?" asked the lad, who 
didn't half like the rebuff he had met with. 

" "Why, boy, because there is a scale of heinous- 
ness in crime that tells us there is a scale of duty 
in virtue also," Uncle Benjamin made answer. 
"Parricide is felt to be the greatest atrocity of 
which human nature can be guilty, and we know 
that it is so simply because we know and feel that 
it violates the highest of all social ties — the tie be- 
tween child and parent. Hence the first duties we 
have to fulfill are the home ones, Ben ; and whe7i 
you have done all that love could wish or want 
for those of your household, why then pass on to 
your friends, and do all the duty of your love to 
them ; and after that, widen the circle of your lov- 
ing-kindness, and do Avhat is due to those that 
want and suffer in your own neighborhood ; and 
when this is done, if your heart have any surplus 
love left, why then extend your charity to your 
whole country ; but beware, lad, beware — " 

The boy waited eagerly for the conclusion of 
the sentence, but Uncle Benjamin remained silent, 
and merely shook his head and smiled at the little 
fellow. 

After a while the old man beckoned to the lad, 
and said, as he drew his godson to him, " Give me 
your ear, Ben. Beware of the cant of loving the 
whole world," he whispered. " Depend upon it, 
there is quite enough to do if you do only half 
what you ought to your relatives, friends, and 
neighbors. Stick to the neighbor, lad! stick to 
the neighbor !" 

" Love your neighbor as yourself," murmured 
the little fellow. 

"Ay, boy; and, depend upon it, you'll find you 
have made a second self, and a better self, outside 
yourself in so doing, for true gratitude is more 



THE START IN LIFE. 649 

than equitable ; it gives back and adds an interest 
that never can be got by law. Remember the 
wisest man tells ns 

*' 'The quality of mercy is not strain'd,'" 
added the godfather, as he laid his hand on his 
godchild's head : 

*' 'It clroppeth as the gentle rain from heaven 
Upon the place beneath : it is twice bless' d ; 
It blesseth him that gi^-es and him that takes.* 

And this, Ben, is the bm'den of om- song." 

The little fellow flung himself upon his knees 
on the hassock at the old man's feet, and burying 
his face in his lap, took up the words, and cried 
aloud in thankfulness for the creed, " ' It is twice 
blessed. It blesseth him that gives and hit7i that 
takes.' " 

Presently Uncle Ben added, "And now the les- 
son of life is ended, and this the moral of all our 
teaching : labor thriftily at your business, boy, 
have graceful amusements, and do your duty." 



CHAPTER XXYI. 

THE START IN LIFE. 

A WEEK elapsed, and Uncle Ben was sitting up 
late in his own room transcribing into his vol- 
umes of manuscript sermons the short-hand notes 
of the last important discourse he had heard, when 
suddenly his little godson bounced into the room 
shouting, 

" Oh, uncle, I've chosen a trade at last. What 
do you think it is ? Now just you guess." 

The old man shook his head as much as to say 
the task was hopeless. 

" Father's been so kind, you can't tell," the boy 



650 YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

rattled on, for he was too elated with his new 
prospects to be other than loquacious. " He's 
taken me round to see all the different kinds of 
businesses in the town, and I went with him a 
little way into the country too, so that I might be 
in a position, as he said, to choose fairly for my- 
self.* Wasn't it good of him ? And he told me, 
do you know, that he was quite pleased to find I 
had got such altered views of life, though he said 
he didn't care much about your — what ever were 
the words he used ? — oh yes, your ' hoity-toity 
notions' about the pleasures of poetry, and so on, 
you know. Still he was delighted when he found 
that I saw the errors of pride and vanity, and that 
I could understand how necessary it was to be 
trustful in the world, and so on, uncle." 

The old man merely smiled in his turn at his 
brother's hard, utilitarian theory of human enjoy- 
ment ; but the pair of them had too often discuss- 
ed the question for Uncle Ben to be at all aston- 
ished at the " hoity-toitiness" that was ascribed 
to him. 

" Well, and what did you see, my little man ?" 
asked the godfather, as he drew young Ben to his 
side, and curled his arm about the boy's waist. 

" Oh, I saw ever such a lot of things, uncle — 
such a lot that I hardly know what I have seen, 
I declare," was the simple answer. "I never 
thought there was so much work going on in the 
world before. Let me see, now, how did father 
begin ? Oh, first he told me, as we went along, 
that the simplest form of labor is that of collect- 
ing the wealth that Nature produces of her own 
accord, and this, he said, includes the work of the 
fisherman, the fowler, and the wild hunter, as well 
as that of the sea-weed and manure collectors, the 
woodmen, and the wild-flower gatherers, together 
* A fact. 



THE START IN LIFE. 551 

with the pickers-lip of shells and minerals along 
the sea-shore." 

" I know, Ben," nodded the uncle ; " all which 
Master Josh got from me, for it was only the 
other night I was telling him about it, after you 
had gone to bed. Well, and after that, I sup- 
pose he told you, come the extractive processes of 
wealth-getting ?" 

" Certainly ; but first father said," added the 
youth, " that it would be needless for me to go 
and see any of the work of collection, because 
such labor would be wholly unsiiited to me. And 
it was the same with the extraction of wealth 
from the earth, he told me, for this includes the 
different forms of mining and quarrying ; though, 
if I liked, I might see a stone-quarry, for father 
said he knew many a fine fellow engaged at that 
business." 

" Go on, Ben," still nodded the old man ; " and 
then followed all the different kinds of labor en- 
gaged in production .^" 

" Yes, uncle," answered the youth, " such as 
farming, grazing, and cattle - breeding ; flower- 
gardening, as well as the growing of fruits and 
vegetables. But I told him I thought I shouldn't 
like to belong to any of those businesses, for 1 
didn't know why it was, but I felt as if I had no 
taste for them. But father said that for his part 
he preferred a country life to a town one, and he 
thought the people in the country more honest 
and better natured than those that lived in the 
cities." 

" Yes, exactly what I observed," tittered the 
old one ; " and next, of course, he said there came 
the different trades that are engaged in working 
up the materials of wealth that the others are 
employed in collecting, extracting, or producing 
from the soil ?" 



552 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

" So he did," young Benjamin exclaimed ; "and 
these he explained to me might be arranged into 
three classes, according as th<ey — as they — " 

" Why, according," the godfather prompted the 
lad, " as they are engaged in working up the raw 
materials into fabrics or stuffs^ and these fabrics 
or stuffs again into articles or coimnodities j or 
else according as they ere employed in improving 
them, that is to say, in strengthening, finishing, or 
beautifying the fabrics or articles manufactured 
by the others." 

" Yes, that's it, uncle, that's it," went on the 
lad ; " fabric-makers, commodity-makers, and im- 
jDrovers — they were the three great forms of handi- 
craft, father said, in all civilized countries. And 
besides these, uncle, he told me there are the help- 
ers^ or those whose business it is either to design 
the work, or to make every thing ready for it, or 
else to assist the men while doing the work itself, 
such as architects, pattern designers, draughts- 
men — " 

" And civil engineers too, all of whom make it 
a business to plan the work that has to be done," 
Uncle Ben proceeded, as he found the little fellow 
at a loss to recall the difficult details, "for these 
are the great designers of the world's handicraft ; 
while the excavators, road-makers and menders, 
as well as the riggers and stowers of ships, are 
the fitters and preparers for other forms of labor, 
even as the hodmen, the wheel-drivers, the layers- 
on, the feeders, and stokers, and, indeed, all those 
lower grades of manual laborers (whose duty it 
is to act as the fetchers, and carriers, and attend- 
ants of the skilled workmen), are merely the as- 
sistants of the others." 

" Then father told me, too, uncle," the boy 
went on again in his turn, " that after the goods 
are manufactured by means of all these different 
kinds of work — " 



THE START IN LIFE. 553 

" And aids to work," suggested the other — 

"There is an immense number of jDeople en- 
gaged in what he termed distributing them into 
the different markets, all over the world some- 
times," added the boy, " and for this purpose, he 
said, there is the great machinery of the carrying 
trades^ 

" Including the merchant-seamen," broke in the 
uncle, " bargemen, boatmen, and canal-men ; the 
coachmen, guards, and wagoners; the carriers, 
carters, and trammen (there were no railways 
then) ; the truckmen, porters, messengers, and 
postmen ; the dock-laborers, warehousemen, and 
storekeepers, as well as the packers and the like." 

" And an equally large number engaged in com- 
merce also," resumed the lad. 

" Such as ship-owners and merchants," explain- 
ed Uncle Ben ; " brokers, factors, agents, and their 
clerks; wholesale dealers and travelers; retail 
dealers and shopmen ; auctioneers, town travel- 
ers, and commission agents ; tally-men, hucksters, 
hawkers, peddlers, and packmen, besides the at- 
tendants at fairs and markets." 

" Oh, isn't it wonderful," burst out the little 
fellow, " that there should be so many different 
kinds of business in the world ! Why, it would 
have taken us years to have seen all of them." 

" Ah ! but we have got only half through the 
list yet, lad," urged the persistent old man. 

"Yes, I know; for father told me," proceeded 
the godson, " that over and above these there are 
the capitalists^ the employers, and superintendents^ 
who, though they do none of the work themselves, 
are always engaged either in aiding and provid- 
ing it for others, or else in watching and testing 
the work done ; and these, father said, might be 
called the foster-ivorkers of society." 

" Of course !" cried Uncle Ben, " the very word 



554 YOUXG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

I gave him, and a good term it is too, I flatter 
myself; for, though the man of money is not di- 
rectly one of labor's own children, he is certainly 
her foster-child, at once maintained by her, and 
maintaining her, as he himself advances in life. 
And under this class, lad, we have what are called 
' sleeping j^artners,' as well as the whole legion of 
bankers and their clerks, of bill-discounters, bill- 
brokers, and scriveners, mortgagees, and j^awn- 
brokers, and, indeed, all those whose vocation it is 
to lend, advance, or procure capital or money for 
such as stand in need of it ; while, on the other 
hand, there is the large class of work superin- 
tendents, as supervisors, overlookers, foremen, 
pay-clerks, inspectors, examiners, viewers, and so 
on." 

" Well, I declare, I never thought society was 
arranged in any thing like the way it is," observed 
the lad. 

" Ah ! but we haven't done yet, little Mister 
Short-sighted, I can tell you," added the old man, 
as he covered the boy's eyes with his hands to 
show him how blind he w^as. 

" But we must have done, uncle," remonstrated 
the lad, as he broke away from the old man ; 
" there can't be any thing else, for that was all 
father went over to me." 

" Can't there, indeed, Mister Clever ?" was the 
playful answer. " Well, sir, I must tell you w^hat 
your father forgot : that there is still a large class 
that live, not by making or producing any thing, 
nor yet by helping or encouraging others to do 
so, but simply by doing something for the rest of 
the world." 

" Well, I can't see how you can make that out, 
uncle," argued the boy, " for if they don't pro- 
duce any thing, as you say, I don't understand 
how they can have any thing to sell." 



THE START IN LIFE. 555 

" Indeed, sir !" answered the godfather, patting 
the boy on the cheek ; " then how do you think 
doctors and clergymen, play-actors and servants, 
soldiers and watchmen, manage to live ?" 

" Ay," ejaculated Master Ben, pulling a long 
face ; " and how would you describe their work, 
uncle ?" 

" Why, I should style them servitors,''^ said the 
elder Benjamin, " for the vocation of every one of 
them consists in rendering some service^ or doing 
some good office to others in the community; and 
as such services lie in ministering to the enter- 
tainment, the well-being, or the security of the 
public, I should class them either as the enter- 
tainers, such as actors, authors, artists, musicians, 
dancers, conjurors, and even servants, all of whom 
are engaged in rendering some temporary service 
to others, or else as the advisers and ioistriictors, 
like the members of the learned professions, and 
the several teachers and professors of the difterent 
branches of learning and science ; or else I should 
group them under the head of public guardians, a 
class which would include the ministers of state, 
the government officers, and the soldiers and sail- 
ors engaged in the defense of the country, as well 
as the legal authorities, and all their dependents, 
together with the several parish functionaries of 
the kingdom. Of these classes, the last two (the 
advisers and guardians) are occupied generally in 
rendering some permanent service, or in doing 
some lasting good' office, rather than (like the en- 
tertainers) affiDrding a mere passing gratification 
to the other members of the community. And 
with these, Ben, we come to an end of the several 
vocations that make up the complex machinery 
of civilized society." 

" Well, I declare," exclaimed the little fellow, 
" it is a tangle — such a tangle that it seems al- 



556 YOUNG BENJAMIN FEANKLIN. 

most impossible to imravel when a chap comes to 
think of it all." 

"Ay, but a little orderly arrangement, a few 
mental pigeon-holes, can soon enable ns to have 
the matter at om- fingers' ends, and to take a bird's- 
eye view of the whole," explained the uncle. " It 
is this mere tidying work of philosophy, as I said 
before, which is the mainstay of the comprehen- 
sive faculty of the mind. Thus we see now that 
the different members of society are engaged ei- 
ther in producing something directly or indirect- 
ly, or else in serving some one temjDorarily or per- 
manently ; and that those who are concerned di- 
rectly in production are occupied either in getting 
the materials, or in working them uj) into com- 
modities, or else in improving the products, or 
helping the workers ; Avhile those who are indi- 
rectly concerned in the same business are occu- 
pied either in distributing the goods, that is to 
say, in carrying them to their different markets, 
or in selling them to the consumers, or else in 
fostering the work itself by joroviding the capital 
or superintending the labor ; whereas those who 
are concerned in doing some service rather than 
producing any thing for the community, are oc- 
cupied either with entertaining, or with advising 
and teaching, or else with protecting and guard- 
ing the public. And this, Ben, makes up the en- 
tire mechanism of civiUzed society." 
• "I see, uncle," added the boy ; "it looks a great 
deal simpler now that we go over it all more rap- 
idly." 

"Well, Ben," asked his uncle, "and which of 
the wheels of this same wonderful piece of ma- 
chinery are you going to work at, lad ?" 

" Why, I really don't know now, uncle, under 
which head to place the trade I've chosen," said 
young Ben, with an air of no little perplexity. 



THE START IN LIFE. 55T 

" Well, are you going to produce any thing, or 
to serve any one, Ben? that's question number 
one," interrogated the elder Benjamin. 

" You see, uncle, I'm not going to produce any 
thing exactly, but only to add something to a 
thing that's already made," the little man replied, 
still boggling over the difficulty. 

" Oh, then, you are going to be an improver of 
some product after it's made, are you ?" inquired 
the godfather. " Well, are you going to strength- 
en it, boy, to put the finishing touches to it, or to 
beautify it?" 

" Do you know, I don't think I'm going to do 
any one of the three. I'm merely going to add 
something to it, uncle. 'Now you guess what it 
is, sir," said the youth, kneeling down on the has- 
sock in front of his godfather, and shaking his 
forefinger with mock authority in his face. 

The old man thought of the little fellow's vow 
that he would be an artist ; so, with a toss of his 
head, he answered, " Oh, I know — you're going to 
be a painter — a house-painter, perhaps," he added, 
with a laugh. 

" No, I'm not," answered the youth ; " I'm go- 
ing to be a printer — a printer of books ! what do 
you think of that, uncle ?" 

"Why, I'm glad to hear you've chosen so sen- 
sibly, lad," the godfather made answer, as he laid 
his hand approvingly on the little fellow's head. 

" And do you know why I preferred that trade 
above all others, uncle ?" the lad asked, as he look- 
ed up affectionately in the old man's eyes. 

" Let me hear your reason, Ben," said the other. 

The little fellow stretched up his hands, and 
pressed the old man's cheeks between his palms 
as he replied, " Why, uncle, because I remembered 
all the nice things you told me about the pleas- 
ures of good books, and I thought if I became a 



55S YOUNG BENJAMIN FRANKLIN. 

printer it would be having a business and the best 
of all amusements too." 

" I'm glad my counsel has guided you so well, 
my child," smiled out the old good counselor. 

"Yes, and what's more, uncle," added the kneel- 
ing boy, " now I'm at your feet, thanking you for 
all your goodness to me, I'll promise you that 
while I do my work I'll not forget my duty." 

The simple expression of the lad's gratitude 
was nigh unmanning the kindly-natured old boy, 
his uncle ; so, when he had guljDed down the ball 
that seemed to rise in his throat, the Puritan god- 
father said, " Get up, Ben. I like no one to go 
upon his knees to his fellows ;" and when he had 
stood the lad erect before him, and made him look 
full in his face, he added, " and now give me your 
hand, like friend to friend, and promise me one 
thing more before we have done." 

The boy gazed straight into his godfather's eyes 
as he answered, " I will." 

" Promise me, sir," went on the other, " that 
in after life, when any mean or savage thought 
crosses your mind, you'll think of Uncle Ben, and 
beat down the ugly impulse before it has time to 
express itself in action." 

The boy merely bowed his head, and answered, 
" I do promise you this." 

And then the old man shook the youngster 
warmly by the hand for a moment, and at last, 
starting from his seat, darted hurriedly from the 
room, crying, " Good -night ! May God bless 
you." 



THE LAST DAY AT HOME. 



CHAPTER XXVII. 

THE LAST DAT AT.HOME. 

Uncle Ben looidd have a feast to celebrate liis 
godson's start in life. Josiah, of course, was as 
strong as usual against "carnal joys" and the 
" love of the flesh-pots," but the mother, mother- 
like, was soon won over to the gastronomic the- 
ory of boyish happiness (for, Puritan as was her 
stock, she had still all a matron's instinctive be- 
lief in the loving-kindness of plum-cakes and pud- 
dings — so long as they were not made too rich, 
she added) ; so the united forces of wife and 
brother were brought to bear against the half- 
ascetic creed of the stern old tallow-chandler, and 
even he (though he had all the martyr element in 
his veins, and could have borne the stake with- 
out wincing) wanted hardness of nature sufficient 
to hold out against brother Ben's kindly banter 
about brother Josh's own early love of pudding, 
and the wife's insidious coaxing and motherly 
appeals. 

Accordingly, a day for the feast was soon fixed, 
and the thirteen members of the Franklin family 
all duly apprised and bidden to the merry-making, 
and in a few days afterward the dame was again 
engaged in thumbing patches of lard over the 
broad sheet of paste that was to roof in another 
apple and pumpkin pie almost as big as a spong- 
ing-bath. Then there was the like brisket of 
corned beef wabbling away, with the dough-nuts 
bumping against the lid, on the hob, and another 
turkey and pair of canvas-back ducks twirhng in 
front of the huge ' :itclien fire, and making the 



560 YOUXG BENJAMIN PKANKLIN. 

whole house savory with their tantahzing per- 
fume. Deborah, too, filled another gallon meas- 
ure of dried api^les and peaches out of the store- 
closet, to be duly stewed for the supper, and on 
the dresser stood another bowl of curds as big as 
a kettle-drum, and another huge jar of honey to 
serve the children for dessert. 

And the day was not far advanced before the 
boys and girls, and the grown young men and 
their wives and little ones, all came swarming 
back again to the hive. Little Esther and Martha 
came first this time, one bringing a bead purse, 
and the other a knitted worsted comforter for 
young Ben ; and scarcely had they kissed the lit- 
tle fellow, and wished him every success in life, 
before Jabez and JSTehemiah, the carpenter's and 
mason's boys, came tearing over the house, the 
former laden with the promised rabbit-hutch ; and 
after them came Zachary, the ship-builder, with his 
motherless little hoj as before ; and John Frank- 
lin, the tallow-chandler from Rhode Island, and 
his young Quakeress wife with her infant in her 
arms ; and Abiah, the sister who had married the 
trader in furs and beaver-skins, but who, to the 
great disaj)pointment of the boys, was now away 
on his travels among the Indian tribes ; Thomas, 
the eldest brother, and hereditary smith of the 
family, came too, and Ebenezer, the young farmer, 
with his intended bride by his side, as well as sis- 
ter Ruth, the captain's wife, with her little brood 
of chicks at her heels — indeed, all were there as at 
the previous feast, even including James the print- 
er, to whom little Ben was going to be bound, and 
Uncle Ben's own son, the cutler — all the Franklins 
were there excepting poor Josiah the outcast. 

And the meriy-making and the games were as 
hearty as ever ; and when the supper was over, and 
the bowls of Dame Franklin's celebrated " lambs'- 



THE LAST DAY AT HOME. 561 

wool" placed upon the table, Uncle Ben bade all 
present fill their mugs to the brira, and gave them 
the toast of the evening — " Health and success to 
young Benjamin Franklin ; and may he live to be 
the man we wish him." 

The candle-store in Hanover Street fairly shook 
again with the volley of brothers' cheers that fol- 
lowed the sentiment ; and when silence was com- 
paratively restored, the little fellow stood up, in 
obedience to a summons from his uncle, and made 
his first speech like a man — a speech that was full 
of faith and hope for the future, and regret for the 
past — a speech that made the good old mother 
weep tears of joy, and the father shake him warm- 
ly by the hand, and bid him " God speed ;" and a 
speech, too, which set all the sisters hugging and 
kissing him, and vowing " he was their own dear 
Benny, that he was." 

And when all was quiet in the house, and Ben, 
and Jabez, and Nehemiah were up in their room, 
playing with Master Toby, the pet Guinea-pig, as 
they prepared for bed, little Benjamin cried sud- 
denly as he was taking olf his shoes, " Oh ! I for- 
got ; I haven't wished Uncle Ben good-night." 

So down he scampered, unshod as he was, and, 
with only his little knee-breeches and his shirt to 
cover him, burst suddenly into the old man's room. 

Uncle Ben was on his knees beside his bed ; and 
as the little fellow crept up and stooped to kiss 
him, he felt that the cheek of his best friend in the 
world was all wet with tears — 

Tears that the godson never forgot — no, not 
even when the practice of the godfather's philos- 
ophy had made him the first embassador from the 
American Republic. 

THE END. 

Nn 



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